


The Old Pieces and The New

by Calliecature



Category: Disney - All Media Types, Disney Cartoons (Classic), Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)
Genre: Binary Swap Characters, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-06
Updated: 2019-05-18
Packaged: 2019-09-12 20:02:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 46,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16878303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calliecature/pseuds/Calliecature
Summary: After a bad break-up with Jared (Who Censored Roger Rabbit, Male! Jessica Rabbit), Rhoda Rabbit (Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Girl! Roger Rabbit) just wanted to hide and pick up the pieces. But life threw a curveball when she met Jesse (WFRR, Male! Jessica Rabbit) again, whose rejection she had accepted a long time ago.





	1. Mistakes Have Been Made

**Author's Note:**

> In every fic I’ve written so far, Jesse is always the one that started noticing Rhoda. Now, let’s turn the tables! Plus, what if a male “Who Censored Roger Rabbit?” version of Jessica Rabbit is in the story?

 

_ Mater would always say girls shouldn’t chase after boys. _

Rhoda Rabbit kept the smile on her face, already regretting her decision.

Jesse stared at her, his face unchanged. In his hands, he held a dainty package of carrot cake that she had made for him.

“Why?” he asked.

Do rabbits sweat? Rhoda wondered if her smile looked like a heavy-duty clamp-on was slowly squeezing her skull.

“Because you’re kind,” she replied, feeling her face burn. Her heart drummed, bare under his detached puzzlement.

She wished she could turn back time and convince her past self that this was a bad idea.

Weeks ago, Rhoda first met Jesse when they became guest stars to a live action movie.

She first noticed him when he had quietly uprighted a trash can that some of the human actors have shoved out of their way.

When one of the crew’s child was there, Jess knelt from his tall frame to help him tie his tiny shoe.

She realized the mysterious pull for what it was, the first time she had made him laugh. Warm and home. Strange words to describe a laugh.

But now… judging from his puzzled scowl, her attraction for his kindness was either kooky or worse, shallow.

“You are!” she laughed nervously at his unconvinced visage. “I’ve seen it! That’s why...” Rhoda looked down, her rabbit ears fidgeting shyly. She took a deep breath and took a leap. “... I want to go out with you!” 

She shrugged sheepishly. “You know, get to know you better.”

Her stomach sank when he saw the “no” in his face long before he would speak. The slight discomfited frown. The pressed lips. The slight lean of his body away from the conversation.

“But if you’d rather not, that’s fine!” She pushed her lips into a smile. “We can still be friends. I’ll just let you be if that’s what you want.”

She felt both a little better and a little worse when his shoulders loosened, his face relaxing into a small, gracious smile. 

“Thank you, Rhoda.”

She rocked on her feet. “You can give the cake if you don’t want it.” Her shoulders shrugged as she looked down on the ground. “It’s just a gift.” A go-out-with-me gift.

The rest of weeks of filming after that was an enjoyable blur. 

“See ya next time!” Rhoda said, happy at least, to have a friend in him. Maybe they would see each other again. In another film perhaps. Or an ad. Or a show.

But they never did. 

How could they? As a cartoon show actress, Rhoda would get up before the sun rises, ready for action and would be out like a light at night. Jesse would work late in the Paint-and-Ink Club and would sleep through the day. 

Rhoda was the fool of family fun. Jesse, the adonis of adult entertainment. 

Though they were both of showbiz, they were also both of different worlds.

Sometimes, they’d see each other in passing. Rhoda would manage a friendly wave whenever she would see him. Usually accompanying Martha Acme.

A faint twinge would touch her. But Rhoda didn’t mind.

_ Mater was right. But don’t worry.  _ **_I_ ** _ like me! _

Fifteen years later, something changed that. 

**XOXOXOXOX**

Rhoda faced the decrepit cottage at the edge of the suburbs. The boards were rotted out. The concrete was fractured. Judging by the state of the tattered roof, she wouldn’t be surprised by the water damage inside. Thick foliage and brambles clutched territorially of what was once a lawn. 

She slumped on the curb. It was already an awful time to reflect on her life choices. Especially when she was on a cracked sidewalk, with a beaten suitcase of distressfully grabbed belongings, borrowed camp gear and a sad shack behind her.

A moist snout licked her out of her reverie. A big, black toon dog nosed her cheek. Rhoda couldn’t help but giggle. The ribsy stray wouldn’t stop following her after she gave him her sandwich.

“You shouldn’t have followed me.” Yet his tail wagged at her touch. “I’m a mess,” she continued.

Rhoda jerked her thumb back at the crumbling cottage. “Like that house.” After a pause, she turned back her head at it. “No offense, Mr. House.”

_ It’s the most that I could afford, _ she had sheepishly said to Mina weeks ago.

_ You’re crazy,  _ Baby Mina said.  _ Afford something else, ya dope! _

Rhoda ducked her face into her palms, remembering everything that had led to this present moment. It wasn’t just because the cottage was literally worth a penny.

It wasn’t just because her ex messed up her head so bad, she couldn’t tell who was right or wrong anymore.

It wasn’t just because Jared fooled around her, she couldn’t tell if it was her fault for not being more, her fault for staying, or her fault for finally leaving.

It wasn’t just because her awkward questions that had lead to his deflections and blame. In their relationship, he said she was overreacting. Too needy. Too insecure.

Maybe it had something to do with living together after a month of blissful dating. He asked and she agreed. Practically married with a shared bank account. That was what love would do, right?

Maybe it had something to do with her gut feeling that something wasn’t right throughout their time together. A feeling that festered worse by gossip columns. The Hollywood Tattler would gleefully print of whom and where Jared had been seen with. And they were many.

Maybe it had something to do with her overlooking his… over-friendliness. She would win him back. They would be like they were when they had started dating. She would make him remember.

But in the end, it had most certainly had something to do with the fact that she wasn’t strong enough. Didn’t love him enough. Didn’t hold on enough.

Because wasn’t that what love would do? Forgive and love anyway?

Rabbit nature. Buggy Bunny warned her the day before Rhoda moved in with him.  _ Rabbits mate for life, doc. _ Artists instill real-life traits to the toons they would create. 

Yet when she had shattered, when they broke up, she waited for that madness to consume her.

It never came.

Because she had never loved him. She just wasted both of their best years and broke herself in the process.

Rhoda laughed, the sound echoing in the empty sidewalk. But it sounded like a sob of a parched well instead. The dog whined in concern. She swallowed, tasting something bitter.

Her hand ruffled the dog’s fur. “A-soup… well, I think their name is A-soup, did say laughter’s the best medicine, and medicine can be bitter.”

She stood up, her cottontail dusting the seat of her red overall dress.

“I still think you chose the wrong toon to follow. But you’re welcome to stay, I guess.”

The gaunt dog wagged his tail. She pointed at the house as they entered the front yard.

“That house is me, and I’m gonna fix it.”

The dog romped off to the backyard. Probably to mark.

Rhoda stood before the “For Sale” picket sign, slapped with a “Sold” sticker.  With her yellow mitts, she grabbed it by the handle and pulled.

And pulled.

She tugged and tugged. The sign’s handle only squashed and stretched with her efforts.

Frowning, she planted her feet on either side of her and imagined she was uprooting the biggest carrot ever.

“Whoah!”

The whole world upended and Rhoda fell back with bunny tail up and her feet flopped over head.

At least she finally got the picket sign off.

“Rhoda?”

She froze. It couldn’t be. She hadn’t heard of that voice for a long time. Except for snatches in the radio, curling in her ears, deep and rich in its velvety tones.

“Rhoda Rabbit?”

In her upside down vision, her eyes finally fixed to the person peering over the fence.

Of course, they had to meet again with her ass up in the air. 

She flipped into a blur, hands firmly pressing down her skirt against closed thighs. This time, in her rightside-up vision, her blue eyes looked up to his tall frame and broad shoulders. Of cool emerald eyes, half-hidden by those wine red locks.

“Jesse!” she grinded out with a well-practiced smile. The last person she wanted to see. Right next to her ex, her ex’s creator and the rabid part of his fanclub.

His face surprisingly broke into a small smile. She still remembered what his genuine smile looked like. 

Her heart thudded.  _ Jeepers, why? _

She tried not to break her act. Rhoda doubted she made a lasting impression or even a good impression on him. Not after her stupid attempt to ask him out years ago. 

Not after the fact that Jared looked so much like Jesse. Only Jared looked slimmer and a few years younger. With violet eyes and hair the color of sunset. She wondered if his artist, Lancy Lupin, was inspired by Jesse’s image.

“It’s good to see you,” he said, looking as perfect and pristine as ever in his suit, provocatively classy.

_ No, it’s not _ , her mind groaned. She was a metaphorical wreck in a literal wreckage. She didn’t need an old friend, especially an old crush, to witness what she had become.

“You too,” she replied, all bright and chippy. Her fingers itched to adjust her blue bow tie with yellow spots. “What’re you doing here?” 

The question was more of curiosity than of consideration. One would have thought someone so debonair would be in the posher side of ToonTown.

“I live next door,” he replied, gesturing at the house beside hers.

Beneath her placid face, Rhoda might’ve made every psychic deaf with her internal, horrified scream.

“Oh that’s great!” she exclaimed.

There was suddenly a thud inside the cottage. Rhoda winced. The house was already breaking down inside. Just like her in real life.

“I’m planning to camp out here while fixing it myself,” Rhoda sheepishly answered to Jesse’s raised brow.

He walked out of his yard and entered hers.

“Let me check what made that-”

“Grrrrrroooowwffff!”

A giant, dark blur dashed toward Jesse before Rhoda could act.

“Jacques, NO!”

Something small and white planted itself between Jacques and Jesse.

Jacques screeched into a halt. He tilted his head at the sight of another intruder.

The fluffy toon cat gave him a quiet, glaring stare, her tail waving contemptuously. 

His tail wagged back in return. He crouched down on his paws and gave her a friendly bark. 

The cat sniffed, as though allowing him to live… for now.

“I’m so sorry!” Rhoda cried, hugging Jacques around his collarless neck if he tried to do anything else. “He can be quite protective.”

Jesse stepped back a little. “It’s okay. So is mine,” he said, gesturing at the cat.

“What’s her name?“ Rhoda asked, looking at the dainty queen regaling them with her presence.

“Veronica.”

“Very elegant,” she commented, letting the cat sniff her outstretched hand.

“But it was too long, so I just call her Ronnie.”

“Very approachable,” she smiled as Ronnie rubbed herself against her.

“What about him? Why Jacques?”

“Remember our co-star in Baby Mina’s shorts?”

“Ash? The Disney Prince?”

“Yup, in his movie, he has a helpful mousey sidekick named Jacqueline.”

“Ah.” He walked past Rhoda and her dog as though Jacques didn’t try to sic him. Peering through the cottage window, he pointed inside. 

“Looks like a beam fell down.”

Rhoda peeked inside beside him.

Jesse crouched down to her height and directed her eyes to the fallen structure. “See that over there? The impact made the dust around it thinner.”

She sucked in her breath. “Whoa, you’re right. I would’ve never have thought of that-” she turned to face him and was suddenly aware at how close Jesse was. 

It didn’t help that his finger gently brushed her ears, pulling away an entangled spiderweb.

She averted her eyes, screaming in herself to get a grip. “I-”

Jacques suddenly appeared and sat between them, his feathery tail accidentally whacking Jesse on the face. At least Rhoda thought it was accidental. Jacques opened his mouth, panting dog breath on to Jesse.

Jesse could take a hint. 

He straightened up. “You’re planning to fix  _ this house _ ?”

Rhoda internally winced, too aware of the house’s desolate state. Jacques gave her one last, reassuring lick before galloping for the backyard again.

“Yes.”

“And camp out here while fixing it?”

She fought control over her face, swallowing another grimace. “Yes,” she replied, offering no explanation. She glanced at the camping gear she had borrowed from Mina, practically unused. 

Jesse stared at her, she could almost hear his gears grinding.  _ Jeepers, he’s judging me. He knows I’ve hit six feet under rock bottom. He’s trying to decide if I deserve pity or punishment. He probably read those tabloids- _

Her breath caught when he kneeled down to meet her eyes.

“Remember the time you told me you liked me because I’m kind?”

A screech resonated inside her like someone suddenly pulled a sword off her skewered gut.

“Yes?” she mildly confirmed.

“I don’t want to sound strange. But you can stay with me while you fix your house.”

Her stomach dropped. Pity. She got pity. Call her a masochist, but she’d rather not have pity. Especially his. 

She called on her straggling supply of sunshine with a cheerful smile. Her cheeks already ached with how many times she had to give it. 

“I’ll be fine!” she brightly said. The mangled rawness inside her twinged. She savagely squelched it.

_ I’m Rhoda goshdarned Rabbit, for Walt’s sake! The slapstick-y bunny who always bounces back! _

His brow furrowed. 

She paused. Was that concern? It couldn’t be.

Plus, she had already inconvenienced Mina when Rhoda had broken down on her. The night that she had broken up with Jared, she was a hysterical sobbing mess in Mina’s doorstep.

_ If only I didn’t confront him. _

She couldn’t be a burden to anyone else. A burden who couldn't fix her own problems. 

“Rhoda...”

He hesitated. His mouth parted as though he had something to say. Rhoda waited. 

Instead, he simply brushed back her bangs. She jolted from the casual touch. 

“You got dust in your hair.”

“Oh.” She patted her white fur and tugged down her ears for inspection. Still cottony white with pink skin. 

He picked Ronnie up. “If you need anything, just ask.”

_ I want to move out again, _ she thought miserably.

But it was too late. She had already bought the house. Never mind that she was an A-list toon star. Never mind that it was easy to buy a house in the 60s. She bought the house for… reasons. 

He gave her a warm smile, worlds away from the smirk he would wear in the magazine covers and centerfolds.

“It’s really nice to see you again,” he quietly said. Rhoda berated herself for thinking it sounded intimate. Like tones dear friends would use in soft conversations at night.

Jesse just wanted friendship from her. Just because her heart was all over the place like TNT-ed tatters…

He left the cat inside his house. Rhoda waved at him when he got into his car and drove off. Probably to rehearse in a club. 

She just wanted to fix her life by fixing the house. She just wanted to avoid the people that were giving her grief. Rhoda couldn’t even blame life for mocking her. Because just like with Jared, she only got herself to blame.

“I should’ve thought who would be my neighbors,” she told Jacques, scratching the back of his ears. 

Then she said the words that had become a recurring theme in her life. “I haven’t thought of that. But I should’ve.”

 


	2. Damages Had Been Done

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Apparently, Jared said you shot one of his admirers out of jealousy,” Edna said, getting straight to the point. Her eyes never left Rhoda. “And that’s why you’re now in hiding.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To those who haven't read the book, Jessica Rabbit in "Who Censored Roger Rabbit" is characteristically the opposite of her movie version. She may be as beautiful, but she was self-centered, manipulative, greedy, promiscuous with no redeeming feature. Jared is her male persona.
> 
> Onwards!

She had no doubt that people think she was crazy.

Sure, disappearing from everyone and buying a tumbledown cottage to fix, might sound a little bit mad.

But as far as Rhoda was concerned, she was in high spirits.

The sun was shining. Birds were chirping. Rhoda hummed a happy little tune as she swept the front yard.

It had been three days since she moved in (or was it camped out?). Already, she felt like she was making progress. She had just finished clearing out all the junk inside the cottage and the garbage truck took the last of the garbage bags awhile ago.

The tune in her throat became bouncier as her mind weaved in the words of her mood. She swept her arms open with a burst of a song.

_"IIIIIII was living in the High East Coast_

_But it made me blue!"_

_One day I was crying a lot_

_And so I move to_

_Faded Lines Street down_

_In ToonTown!_

_A brand new house soon up-to-ace!"_

The rusted gutter in the roof creaked as it dropped even lower.

_"Jared doesn't know about this place,_

_But that's not the reason why I'm heeeeeeerree!"_  she sang, raising her arms to the height of the song.

Toon mockingbirds landed on the trees around her.

" _She's the crazy ex-girlfriend!_ " they chorused.

Rhoda startled but continued dancing to the beat.

"What? No, I'm not."

" _She's the crazy ex-girlfriend!_ " they chirped again, hopping to the tune.

She frowned, still dancing. "Is this coming from Hollywood Tattler again?"

_"She's the crazy ex-girlfriend!"_

Rhoda stopped dancing, her hands on her hips. "Can you guys stop singing for one second?"

_"She's so broken insiii-iiiide!"_

Her hand slapped over her eyes. "What did he say this time?" she sighed.

_"C-R-A-Z-Y!"_

"That's the last time I'm handing out bird seeds!" she yelled.

" _Crazy ex-girlfriend!_ " they trilled one last time before flying. A rolled tabloid landed on her feet.

Rhoda stared at it, biting her lip. Unrolling it with trepidation, she read with one eye closed, already leaning away.

It was only a small column, his smirking face gracing over it.

**_H_ e _artbroken Hollywood Hearththrob Heals_ **

**_Asked about his life after being jilted by A-list toon star, Rhoda Rabbit, top model and actor Jared Lupin proclaims, "I missed her as the day she left. But my darling had always been insecure no matter how much she has been the center of my life."_ **

Her eyes popped in disbelief. She picked her jaw from the newly raked ground and read on.

**_Jared Lupin went on how Rhoda woul_ d be very possessive of him. **

**_"She would always makes mountains out of mole hills. I tried my best to show her how much I have loved her. She has always been close friends with Ash from Disney even though I knew that rabbits would be rabbits."_ **

Rhoda sputtered, choking in her own spit. She hacked and heaved, blearily continuing to read the rest.

_**Rhoda Rabbit, who plays as the sweet bunny nanny in the Baby Mina shorts, may not be as what she seems on screen. No one knows of her whereabouts ever since the last filming of Baby Mina's cartoon shorts.** _

_**When asked if he had any message for her, this is Jared's response.** _

_**"Rhoda, I just want you to know that I don't understand why you broke apart. I've done my best to be a dedicated lover. I hope you've calmed down wherever you are so that we can talk."** _

A rumble erupted in her throat. The tabloid crinkled as her hands crushed and clenched. She couldn't believe Jared would be so low enough to...

But most of all, she felt confused.

_Was that how it really happened?_

Jared's voice echoed inside her head.  _"You're always overreacting, Rhoda."_

Her whiskers drooped. Maybe if she had been strong enough to hold on and talk it over with him, they would have cleared the air. Maybe it had all been a miscommunication.

But something in her gut disagreed.

She sighed, tossing it into the pile of the next campfire fuel.

In the distance, she could hear Jacques barking at the birds. She breathed deeply, turning around.

"My morning isn't ruined yet," she told herself through huffs. "My morning isn't ruined yet. My morning isn't-"

The words suddenly died when she saw Jesse standing there with a steaming mug.

"Jesse!" she said in surprise.  _Jeepers, I hope he didn't see that._  "What're you doing here?"

He handed her the mug. "Checking up on you."

She glanced at the clear, warm jasmine tea inside. "You remember?" she asked, astonished.

It was more of an acquired taste. During their filming together, Rhoda had been forbidden to drink coffee (not that she needed it). A normal amount of caffeine tended to make her break the sound barrier. However, she felt left out with the morning mingling without a drink. So someone recommended jasmine tea instead.

He smiled. "I remember the last time someone gave you espresso."

She gave a sheepish laugh, aware that she just had three mugs of brew. In the bumpy times with Jared; Rhoda had been more and more drained. So she coped by drinking obscene amounts brewed coffee.

"You slept well?" she asked, ridding out such dark thoughts.

She practically got his schedule down. Jesse would be home from the club after midnight. The first night, Rhoda had woken up when he drove home from work.

Jesse nodded. "How's the house-fixing?"

Rhoda beamed, grateful to sweep ex-related headaches under a rug. "Great! I cleared out all the debris in the backyard and here and inside the h-" She stopped herself. Jared had once snapped at her that she never shut up.

"I mean, it's going well," she ended apologetically.

If he found her behavior odd, he didn't let it show. "I want to help too."

"What?"

He gestured at the cottage. "I'm not doubting your skill, but I don't think you can fix that by yourself."

She felt her heartstrings stretched in opposite directions. Jesse had always been a good friend. But she didn't need him knowing how low she had become.

"Thanks, Jesse. But I don't want to impose. Besides, you might get your hands rough or get injured or-"

 _Empty heads often have mouths full of blabber_ , Jared's voice sneered inside her head.

"-or whatever bad might happen!" she ended before firmly closing her mouth.

Jesse knelt down on one knee to match her eye level, looking stately as ever. Her mind immediately blanked.

"Rhoda-"

She stomped down the urge to brush back his bangs. It had fallen in a stylish wave over his eye.

"-I don't mind getting dirty if it's with you."

There was a drop of silence as they both digested what he said.

Rhoda suddenly burst out laughing. She slapped a hand over her face, the other clutching her stomach. Cachinnations seized her and her feet stomped for control. She careened to the side at the absurdity of it all, her rabbit ears twisting into knots as she lost all sense to oxygen deprivation.

"That… might not be my intended effect," Jesse commented, lips pulled in amusement.

She slapped a friendly hand on his shoulder, covered by a yellow work glove. "You've always been funny, Jesse! You shoulda been a comedienne like me!"

He laughed quietly. "I'll consider that career change," he replied dryly.

She shook her head.  _As if Jesse would ever…_

In all truthfulness, she couldn't imagine Jesse hammering nails in his tux. Now that she had thought about it, he would probably be too preoccupied and wouldn't be around at all.

Rhoda cleared her throat. "Alright, you can come by and help if ya want."

"I'll make time," he responded. "For now, I need to prepare for modelling."

She internally gave herself a pat for her prediction. He meant well. But he's gonna be super busy.

Her hand waved goodbye at his departing figure before she sighed. She put her hand over her chest, feeling the light headed sensation after a good laugh.

When was the last time she had really laughed again?

 _Who knew it would be because of Jesse?_  She smiled to herself.  _He could be silent and stoic. But he genuinely cares._

She paused. Then she frowned suspiciously at the warmth inside her. She ended up glaring cross-eyed. "That better be within friend limits," she warned herself.

Rhoda shook her head like a dog shaking water off. Her rabbit ears flapped everywhere. She composed herself, running a hand over her hair.

"You're just confused," she told herself empathetically. That had been 15 years ago and she just got out of a failed relationship.

 _All I have to do is keep him at arm's length. No problemo!_  Rhoda thought confidently.

The rest of the day was spent peeling generations of wallpapers off the cottage interior.

Her ears perked at the sound of Jacques barking. There was a creak of the front gate. Curses. Then a knock on the door.

Curious, Rhoda answered it.

"Hey there, rabbit," Edna Valiant greeted with a sober scowl. Her trench coat had slobber all over it. Jacques barked before running off. "Nice dog."

"Edna!" she ducked behind the door a little. "What're you doing here?"

Edna stared at her. Rhoda felt like she was being x-rayed.

"Do you know you're a suspect for murder?"

Her jaw dropped. She picked it up from the faded floor. "What?!"

"Apparently, Jared said you shot one of his admirers out of jealousy," Edna said, driving straight to the point. Her eyes never left Rhoda. "And that's why you're now in hiding."

Rhoda sputtered. "Wha-? How? I-? What?!"

Edna rolled her eyes. "Settle down. Ain't you gonna invite me into your ..." she looked around, "house?"

Distracted, Rhoda led her to the backyard. Edna sat on a log that served as a bench near an extinguished campfire.

"Do you want tea or anything?" Rhoda asked.

But Edna shared her bag of jelly beans instead. "Keeps me sober," she explained. "Now start from the beginning."

"How did you find me?" Rhoda blurted out, taking out a red jellybean.

"A detective got her ways," Edna said mysteriously. "But that's not the question, is it? Where have you been yesterday 5 to 10 PM?"

"In here, fixing the house." Rhoda jerked her thumb to Jesse's house. "Jesse could vouch for me although he would leave for work around six."

Edna suspiciously looked at the house. "Jesse Krupnick, huh?"

"Yup," Rhoda replied, not noticing the laconic twitch in Edna's mouth. "Who knew he'd be in the quiet part of ToonTown?"

"So what've you been doing at night?"

"When the sun sets, I take this off," she continued, gesturing at her baggy, red coveralls.

Edna held up her hands when Rhoda unzipped the front. Only to reveal the one-piece swimsuit she was wearing underneath.

"Then I go to the tub, wash off and go to my tent to get dressed," Rhoda explained. She zipped back her coveralls.

Edna grunted. "Anyone else saw you?"

Rhoda amiably rolled her eyes. "Edna, I know Jesse. He's the perfect gentleman." She gestured at herself. "Besides, it's not like he'd be-"

"No, you goof.I mean did anyone else saw you yesterday around 5-10?"

"The other neighbors, I guess." Rhoda shrugged. "I'm just out here in the open, fixing house."

She tried to check the time by looking at the sun. She flinched at the glare. "I go to sleep around nine."

Edna wrote on her notepad. "'Kay."

Rhoda's brows furrowed in concern. "Edna, if I'm a suspect, does that mean Toon Patrol's trying to find me?"

"It's actually a human case. So it's the police who're trying to find you."

Her ears drooped. "Are the police going to take me?"

"Depends." Edna tapped Rhoda's nose with her notepad. Her rabbit ears straightened up reactively.

Rhoda blinked. "Who are you doing this investigation for?"

Edna paused. Rhoda saw the way her eyes flickered in her composed visage.

Her ears drooped again. "Please tell me you didn't get involved because of me."

"I ain't getting soft, rabbit," Edna gruffly said. "The chief just wants me to find you for them." She popped a jellybean in her mouth. "They ain't keen in going to this crazy place."

But Rhoda only looked more concerned, leaning over to grip Edna's arm.

"Jared smears anyone that I'm with," she pleaded. "People already think Ash and I-" she reddened, "You know. Because Jared kept blaming I'm  _active_  as a real rabbit."

She covered her face with her hands. Jared kept mentioning that misconception even though she had explained that actual rabbits don't "go at it like rabbits".

Edna snorted. "I'd like to see him try."

"Is he okay? Ow!" Rhoda flinched when the notepad slapped her across the face.

"Really, Rhoda?" Edna asked.

"C'mon, Edna!" Rhoda held her cheek even though it didn't really hurt. "Jared might be… exaggerating but I don't want him in danger!"

"Do you know the DeGreasy Sisters?"

"The bigshots who hire toons and photograph them into comics?"

"Shady business down the side. One of them got killed. Jared has been dating the victim."

"Oh." She looked down on the ground. "I'm sorry to hear that."

"Do you think Jared could've done that?"

Rhoda looked up, shocked. "No!" she gasped. "Why would he want anyone get killed?"

Edna raised a brow. "Suppose he wants to get rid of someone, what'll he do?"

Rhoda shut her eyes tight and shook her head.

"C'mon, Rhoda. You know him better than most."

Rhoda sighed. "He wouldn't want to get his hands dirty. He'd want someone else to do it for him." She gestured around. "Because for Jared, you're either someone not worthy of his time or someone he can... "

Her eyes widened. But her mouth refused to say it.

... _use_.

It was like the whole cottage collapsing on top of her.

Jared had became a recurring star in Maroon Cartoon Studios because of her being one of the studios' biggest stars. She used to personally ask RK Maroon to give him roles every month.

His outright flirtations that had led on so many women. She remembered feeling anxious at his behavior every time women caught his eye. It hurt when he would always come home late, knowing who he had been with.

She remembered feeling relieved when he would give them a cold shoulder after a couple of weeks. But she also felt bad for feeling relieved at the women he would cut off, making her feel worse. Jared would tell them he already have her, making her feel elated because it meant he chose her in the end. Then he would repeat the cycle all over again.

His admirers resented Rhoda. Encouraged by his coquettish behavior, they were brazen in swaying Jared to leave her for them.

Jared never wanted to be with anyone. Not even her. He used those women to satiate his ego and leave when he was done.

But most of all…

A part of her pleaded her to stop.

… Jared hadn't just used her as personal funding and connections. He also made her an excuse and an obstacle to his fanclub.

Now that he was a free man again, he was climbing for business women and toon tycoons. Another A-list toon star was no longer good enough.

She shook away the thoughts, looking sheepishly at Edna. "But maybe I might be wrong?"

Edna slapped her notepad on top of Rhoda's head.

"Ow! Edna-"

Edna held her thumb and index finger a breath apart. "Rabbit, you were  _this_  close to getting it."

"Well, Jared always said that I could be-"

"I don't care what he thinks! What do  _you_  think?"

Rhoda paused. "I…"

All those years, it had always been her fault. Her fault for her own shortcomings.

_But Jared always said… wait a minute._

Her fault for  _his_  own shortcomings.

_What do **I** think?_

Every time she would protest, Jared would indignantly proclaim that she got it all wrong. That what she was feeling, not what he did, was the problem. He would sigh and roll his eyes every time she tried to explain her view, that she started wondering if he was right.

Her ears and whiskers laxed as her eyes bugged. Her eyelid twitched.

"That can't be… I..."

She stood up. Her view reeled to the side.

"Excuse me, I think I'm feeling a little perked," she said, her voice strained.

She walked straight for her tub of bathwater. There was a giant splash when Rhoda dove her head under the pool.

Edna simply watched when gurgling screams emitted with the bubbling water.

She flinched when Rhoda's shrieks reached maximum volume, blasting all the water out of the tub.

Water dripped down the brim of her hat. Edna sat there, a soaked parody of normalcy.

"Are you good?" she asked.

Tight-lipped, Rhoda just gave a thumbs up. She went straight for her tent and grabbed a pillow. Rhoda mushed her face against it and screamed some more.

Feathers exploded everywhere when the pillow reached past its screech tolerance. Edna sat there, looking like a feathered parody of normalcy.

Rhoda gasped, surfacing for air. Edna patted her on the back, looking like she only had three seconds to disguise herself as a chicken.

"Easy there, bunny."

Rhoda clutched her face, trying to determine if she was in a dream. “He can’t be using me!” She turned to her wildly. “We’ve been together for fifteen years! He can’t be! I-”

Her hands fell limply to her sides. “ I...”

Edna had her lips pressed together, stopping herself from saying something.

“I really am hare-brained, am I?” Rhoda said  with a hollow laugh. 

She glanced at Edna who grimaced like a beakless hen. Edna looked like she had always known it all along. Maybe Edna had told her before. Maybe she had hinted it with her sarcastic wisecracks. Maybe Rhoda just didn't realize.

"Rhoda, you might be a bit of a cuckoo-"

"You mean a cuckoo  _cluck_?" she chided. But her eyes were still gazing at something far away.

Edna clamped up, lost for words. She patted Rhoda on the back, trying not to feel awkward.

"If you need a hooch, tell Doris to put it on my tab." She shifted uncomfortably, feeling a need for a drink herself. She popped another jelly bean instead. "You can come with me to the bar if you want."

"Thanks, Edna. But I'll be fine."

"Rhoda… I..."

"I really am glad you started helping toons again," Rhoda said. "If I ever get into trouble, my money's on ya."

Edna smirked. It looked forced. "Only because you're harebrained enough to drag me back every time," she replied, messing the top of Rhoda's head.

She grinned, even though her lips wavered. "Thanks, Mama Hen."

Edna messed Rhoda's hair harder. A few feathers flew.

"We still haven't caught who vandalized your trailer."

"That's okay." Deep inside, Rhoda winced. Her eyes caught the sledgehammer leaning against the cottage. "I still got some walls to bust out."

Edna turned to go. She paused before facing her again with a sigh.

"Rhoda. In all my times of me being a detective, I've known women who poisoned their men to get away from them."

Rhoda cringed. She couldn't imagine herself doing that to Jared.

"But you know what's worse? Women who left but are still poisoned by the very men they're escaping."

Rhoda didn't know what to say. She waved goodbye to Edna as she left, relieved that she no longer could see the pity and concern in Edna's feather-covered face.

Edna walked out of Rhoda's property, not bothering to brush off the plumes covering her. Just another day in ToonTown.

She scowled at the unassuming house next to it. Her hand touched the fence as she began to decide what to do next.

"Aren't you going to cross the road?" a deep voice drawled.

She turned around to see Jesse coming back from… wherever he had been.

"Here to snoop again?" he asked.

She internally cursed when the sleeve of her trench coat caught on the fence. She was stuck and looking like a cheep chicken costume.

 _Cheap chicken costume_ , she corrected herself.

"I don't know what you mean."

"Says the detective who lurks outside my dressing room window whenever Ms. Acme came to visit."

"You're still hanging that over my head?" Years ago, RK Maroon wanted dirt for Acme. Turned out he wanted to secure Acme's will. Unfortunately, RK died in a skirmish. Her twin sister, CB, took over Maroon Cartoon Studios after.

Edna tried to tug out the snag, careful not to tear her sleeve. She cursed when Jesse walked nearer.

"Maybe I should roll an egg down the road and see who finally came first," he dryly stated.

Edna made a face at him.

"What're you really doing here?" he asked.

"Visiting my pal," Edna said, watching Jesse's face.

His eyes narrowed and she saw him glance at the rundown cottage. "You? Her friend?"

"I should be asking the same thing." She slowly work out the thread caught in the blasted nail. "Funny that Rhoda chose to live beside someone who looks a lot like her ex."

"Her what?"

CRASH!

They both startled.

CRASH!

The giant, black dog began to bark. Jesse could see him ran inside the cottage.

CRASH!

Forgetting Edna, he hurried towards it. Jacques ran out, barking frantically. When he saw Jesse, he whined. His ears were laid back and his tail wagged low and anxious. He anxiously scraped the ground with his front paws. It almost looked like he was begging Jesse to do something.

CRASH!

**XOXOXOXOXO**

Rhoda bashed the walls into smithereens. Everything exploded in a cloud of dust. But Rhoda continued, unperturbed. A kerchief protected her nose and mouth. Goggles were strapped over her eyes.

"I'm sorry," she whispered through gritted teeth, the words barbed and hurting her throat.

That had been the recurring words of her life for the past 15 years.

Every time she would communicate her discomfort in his actions, he would always turn it on her. She was too needy. She was overreacting. She was being annoying. She should grow up.

And she would cower, ashamed and guilty of what she had been thinking and feeling.

 _Sorry_ , she would mumble.

It was all her fault, she had thought. She just needed to do better in their relationship and avoid pushing him away with her actions.

So for the past 15 years, she had tried. And tried. Swallowing bitterness and exhaustion along the way. Every time he strayed. It was her fault. She was too clingy. She didn't work hard enough in their relationship. One way or another, it always come back to her and her shortcomings.

Rhoda could still remember the night that they had broken up.

_"Was I the one who chose to cry, Rhoda?" he asked while he sat with his back on her, fixing his hair in the vanity table mirror._

_Tears spilled down her face, wondering if he even cared._

_"That was your choice," he continued. "Instead of, you know, thinking like a reasonable rabbit."_

She might've bewildered Mina when she came crying in her doorstep. She remembered mumbling apologies for being such a burden and wailing that she had ruined everything with Jared.

CRASH!

She whirled the sledgehammer expertly above her head like a regular comedy mallet.

CRASH!

Rhoda was far away from Jared as possible. But he was still using her one way or another to publicize himself. She wouldn't be surprised if tomorrow, Jared would be hinting to the world that she killed his girlfriend.

CRASH!

She brought it down with an almighty smash. Her chest heaved. Tears drenched her face. She gritted her teeth against the painful crushing in her heart.

Jacques barked from the distance. She blinked. The walls sectioning the cottage had all been decimated.

"Rhoda?"

She gasped. Jesse. Tears seeped outside her goggles. Her eyes felt raw. Her throat felt like a burnt out firecracker. Snot dripped down her nose.

"Rhoda?"

In the last minute, she tore off her goggles and threw away her kerchief. She scooped dust and slapped it on her face. She felt pathetic but she knew Jesse. He would get worried and she didn't want to burden him with her own emotional baggage.

She had enough from Jared feeling like she was a pest.

The shaft of light from the doorway darkened. "Are you alright?" he asked.

"Yeah!" She coughed and spat out dirt. "I- uh, I forgot to put on goggles and mask." Her ears tried to wipe her face. "Ooh, that stings."

Her lip trembled. She looked away.

"I've been meaning to bust these walls anyway. You know, because it looks so dark in here? Saves on electricity too," she blabbered, hating herself for it.

Her fingers felt numb. She flexed and straightened them. She didn't hear his steps nearing her, gentle and measured.

She coughed. "But it looks like I dirtied the place all over again. Jeepers, my ears are ringing. What if I didn't hear you all those time you've been hollering? I'm-" Her throat caught. "I'm sorry."

Jesse regarded her. He looked out of place in the dismal cottage, the sunlight behind him making him look like a greek god that descended down on earth.

"Are you okay?" he asked again, kneeling down to her gaze level.

She smiled, even though her heart felt like it was crumbling into dust. "I'm fine."

He put a hand on her shoulder, unmindful of the grime and dust on her coveralls.

"If you won't tell," he quietly asked, "I won't ask."

Her stomach plummeted. Was she really that see-through and pathetic? But he was offering her a way out and for that, she was grateful.

Her hand hovered over his, careful not to smear it with dirt but wanting to reassure his gesture.

"Thank you, Jesse."

She wanted to rest. She wanted to step into Jesse's arms and just cry on his shoulder.

But that would be being a burden. And she only got herself to blame.

_Jared might've used me. But I'm the one who stayed._

Fortunately, Jacques came inside and practically knocked her down with his over-enthusiastic greeting. Rhoda found herself giggling and protesting as Jacques licked her face. Guilt touched her when he anxiously whined, his ears and tail lowered.

"Sorry, ol' boy," she replied, touching her forehead to Jacques' brows.

Jesse left to prepare for Ink-and-Paint club. Rhoda swept the rubble inside the cottage, wiping away the rest of her sniffles. When she went outside, his car was gone. There was a Chinese takeout on the log that she used as her bench near the campfire.

A note beside it read:  _Fed Jacques. Don't worry, takeout's vegetarian. Take care. -Jesse_

Her heart twinged. She should really keep him at arm's length.

Jacques belched, romping to her side. Rhoda hugged him tight, burying her face into his fur.

Insider her tent, the radio garbled and blared, unheard.

"So it looks like there's a storm coming right here in ToonTown. It's gonna be a tempest, folks. I pity the fool who's gonna be camping."

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song that Rhoda sang is based on the opening theme of "Crazy Ex Girlfriend". Here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzY3EaJTuJk
> 
> Enjoying the story so far? You can buy me coffee if you want: ko-fi.com/calliecature


	3. Feelings Had Been Forgotten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In an effort to hold herself together, Rhoda was determined to keep the man who was affecting her heart at arm's length.

**Chapter 3: Feelings Had Been Forgotten**

The sun was shining brightly.

But that wasn't what bamboozled her.

Rhoda glanced at Jesse, baffled. He placed down the Acme wooden boards that she had ordered. For once, Jesse was simply wearing jeans and a button-down shirt, its sleeves rolled up to the elbows.

She turned back to the plank that she was hammering.

_I should've known he would keep his word._

A smile began to pull in her lips.  _I don't understand why people think he's a snob. He warms up once he'd let them in._

She stilled, feeling uneasy at the tenderness in her thoughts. She hastily shut down its course, ending wherever it might lead to.

She already knew where.

_C'mon, Rhoda. This is why we need to keep him at arm's length!_

So the whole day, they simply worked. Rhoda limited her words to "Thank you", "Over there" and "You're welcome".

From afar, she could see Jacques and Ronnie playing. Or what seemed to be a game in their own way. Ronnie sat on the fence, pretending to ignore him. Jacques would make different barks, jumping and wagging his tail to get her attention.

Rhoda giggled.

"Ow!" she cried, accidentally hammering her thumb.

Jesse looked up. She grinned apologetically and hid her hand.

"I'm okay!" she said, pretending to shake it off.

They were done replacing the wooden flooring by the time the yawning sun was setting. Rhoda smiled to herself.

 _It just needs some polishing. Finally! Things are getting done!_ She stretched her arms.  _Most of all, I'm keeping my distance from-_

"I knew you grew up in a farm," Jesse spoke up. "But I didn't know you were such a handyman."

She could've just nodded and moved on. But Jesse surprised her. From what she knew of him, he would hardly start a conversation, preferring simply to go with the flow.

"Mater taught me everything she knew," Rhoda replied. "She used to carry a tool belt like this," she smiled down at her own, feeling nostalgic.

Something mentally tapped her shoulder.  _What happened to keeping him at arm's length?_  Asked the voice that was more concerned of holding herself together.

She cringed. The skeletons rattled in her closet.

_And do you really want to think about Mater right now?_

Jesse nodded slowly, digesting the information. "I never knew that."

Rhoda shrugged, shutting down unwanted thoughts.

"There's a lot of things you don't know about me," she replied, hoping that would end the conversation.

She turned her back and silence followed. Relief washed over her and she prepared to pack up her tools.

But after some time, the quiet felt different. Panicking that she might've gone too far, she sneaked a glance at Jesse.

Only to see Jesse looking at her with an expression that she couldn't read.

"You're right." He straightened up and dusted himself. "Would you like to have dinner at my house?"

Confusion struck her. She had been nothing short of tepid, and now he was inviting her over?

"It must've been a while since you've eaten something that isn't camp food."

She wanted to tell him no. Jesse was making her heart spin when it had just been throttled. And ripped. And grounded. And burned. And disfigured. And-

"Okay."

Through her amiable smile, Rhoda wanted to walk right into a rake.

If Jesse noticed that it took her awhile to answer him, he didn't show it.

 _Then again, Jesse usually kept his cards to himself_ , she thought.

"Come at seven," he said before he left. "You can bring Jacques too."

Rhoda sighed as soon as she heard his door closed. She took off her work glove, deflating with relief when she saw that her thumb was painlessly normal again.

Ever since she broke up with Jared, her tooning had been out of whack. The crew barely finished producing the rest of the Baby Mina shorts, because Rhoda kept messing her lines. Her bloopers were putting them over the budget, that CB Maroon called her into her office.

Rhoda pushed away her thoughts and walked out to the backyard. She took off her tool belt and tugged down her coveralls. Stepping inside the tub, she sank into the soapy water instead of doing her usual rigmarole.

Her past conversation with CB echoed in her head.

" _Get back with him," CB said when she confessed why she kept screwing up her act._

" _W-what?"_

" _You can't toon well because you're unhappy. You're unhappy because you missed him."_

_Rhoda looked down. Her gut twisted with dread. For some reason, CB's words reminded her of how Jared would tell her what she was supposed to be feeling._

" _N-no," she answered, hating how weak she sounded. She gripped the hems of her overalls dress. "I don't want that."_

_CB swivelled on her seat with a sigh._

" _Rhoda, you're the sweet bunny nanny of your show." She rubbed her temples. "You're supposed to be good and forgiving."_

_Her hands clenched the edges of her dress tighter. Something hot surged in her, that it took her by surprise when she realized what it was._

Why am I mad?

" _Look, you both work at my studio," CB said. "But if this persists, I'll have to let you go."_

Rhoda sunk deeper into the water. With Jared slandering her name, the polls wouldn't want her to be in the Baby Mina show anymore.

She finally went through the motions of scrubbing herself. Climbing out of the tub, she put on her bathrobe over her one-piece swimsuit.

"I just have to go one day at a- DAY?!" she startled.

It was already dark. Strangely, no lights were coming from the other houses. If she would look up, she would've noticed the swirling storm clouds.

But she didn't.

She jumped into her tent, fumbling for her alarm. Rhoda yelped upon seeing the time. The tent barely contained her rush to get dress. She stumbled out, finger-combing her hair. Jacques bounded along her.

 _I was going to help Jesse make dinner!_ She thought with exasperation.  _He's already going through the trouble cooking one and I'm too busy stewing!_

She allowed herself to chuckle before she continued admonishing herself.

Zipping to his front door, she knocked. Jacques nosed her hand.

 _Just dinner and small talk. Keep him at arm's length,_  she told herself.

Jesse opened the door and let them in. He was back in his signature suit.

"I'm sorry!" Rhoda said, Jacques trailing behind her. "I was going to help you make dinner but-"

She stopped functioning upon seeing the dim room. The dining table was glowing with candles, giving it a romantic air.

"There has been a blackout," Jesse said. "Have you heard? There's a-"

Rhoda internally face-palmed with as much hands as she could imagine. His voice blurred in the background.  _Jeepers, what's wrong with me? Am I that starved for love and affection? This is why I should've told him no in the first place!_

"-so I hope you got your cottage covered," he continued.

"Of course!" Rhoda chirped, glad that she was able to keep track of their conversation. She had boarded up the windows to keep away dust.

He led her on a chair. Rhoda sat on it stiffly, determined to play the role of a good guest.

 _Just small talk, Rhoda. Keep him at arm's length,_ she thought as Jesse put potatoes on her plate.

"Thank you."

Jesse sat down across from her. She kept her eyes down on her plate, feeling the weight of his gaze.

"Remember when Director Minkoff wanted Carla to do that stunt in high heels?" he asked.

Rhoda looked up, surprised.  _He sure has changed._  Usually, he was content with silence between peers.

Then again, perhaps he just wanted to be a good host.

She hesitated. Then brightened a bit. A smile quirked in her lips. "And Carla dared him to do it in heels first?"

Jesse shook his head. "It's a pity the director chickened out. I would've loved to see it."

He watched her break down into giggles, pressing down an amused smile of his own.

"And remember that actor who went red in the face," she puffed up her chest, hands akimbo. "Bragging on and on of how famous he was?"

She stood up abruptly, a curl in her lip. "Don't you know who I am?" she mimicked the actor's fake accent.

"Then all you said was..." She zipped to the other side of her chair with a stoic face, her rabbit ears swept into Jesse's hairstyle. "Don't you?" she spoke in her best baritone. "Then you walked away like you didn't just zap him!" she exclaimed, collapsing into guffaws.

She surfaced again, wheezing. "I'm serious, Jesse. You should've been a comedian."

Jesse took his time to cut his food. "I was going to audition for the Baby Mina show a long time ago."

Her ears perked in surprise. "Really?" A year before she met Jesse, none had passed the auditions for the male-cast. So the studio head borrowed characters from Disney. One of them was Ash the Disney Prince.

"Jeepers, we could've been co-stars," she said, lost in thought at the image of her, Jesse and Baby Mina filming together. "That would've been great!"

She thoughtfully put her hand on her chin. "Although Ash is also a pretty good colleague." Her face broke into a fond smile. "He helped me not to lose hope in finding true love."

Rhoda froze, reddening brighter than a stoplight.

"I mean before I met you. NOT after I met you!" She chuckled nervously, her rabbit ears twiddling shyly together. "There was this rabbit before who turned me away-"

She wanted nothing more than for Elma Fudd to appear and blast her with her rifle. The last thing she needed was to spill how she got stupid enough to ask him out.

"But it's all water under the brick now," she smoothed over. In truth, she was having as much serenity as someone who had stubbed their toe.

"Don't you mean bridge?"

Her lips twitched into an innocent grin. "I 'Jesse' it that way," she shrugged.

"If you say s-" his eyes widened. Then he covered them with his hand. But Rhoda could see his shoulders shaking.

"Gotcha," she said in a sing-song voice, laughing along with him.  _Once you know how to make a person laugh, that's when you know them well,_  she inwardly grinned.

She stopped, confused, when she saw him leaned back. He regarded her, his head tilted to the side, with a smile that she couldn't read.

"Why're you looking at me like that?" She wished he wouldn't. It was making her heart raced.

Maybe she didn't know him as well as she thought.

"I'm glad you're back," he said.

Rhoda chuckled. "Jesse, where have you been for the last couple of days?"

"I mean, the Rhoda that I know is finally back."

She stilled. "What do you mean?"

"You haven't been yourself lately."

She swallowed, her soul feeling bare under his emerald eyes.

Then he smiled. It was innate. It was warm. And it was tearing her apart.

"You just… 'Rhoda' boat," he said.

She burst out laughing. But her mind echoed with sobs that she couldn't let out. She collapsed in her arms, chuckling. But in truth, it was also to contain the hearts threatening to pop all around her.

_Please stop reminding my why I lo- liked you!_

It was pun-y. But she got what he was saying just the same.

His eyes crinkled more when her grin told him she received the context.

It was true that Jesse valued relationships. But it wasn't the kind of relationships that people expected from him.

He saw past her star status that was equal to Micka Mouse and Buggy Bunny. He became her friend for… whatever reason he saw in her. Maybe she was an okay kind of person? She hoped she was.

There was a lull of comfortable silence before she spoke.

"Remember, when I was joking about forming a one-pun club?" she quietly said, reminiscing the good times. "We're the only official members."

"It's my pun-ishment to bear so others may live," he replied dryly.

She leaned back, theatrically slighted. "Oh c'mon! You can't deny I'm a pretty good com-pun-ion!"

"The rest of the crew became 'bored' of directors because they couldn't stop groaning," he coolly pointed out with a raised brow of amusement.

She whooped with approval, raising her hand for a high-five. He calmly met it with his palm, unperturbed by her ecstatic energy.

It was like they were back again in the old set, waiting for their scenes to be shot next.

She knew she should be distancing herself. But Rhoda was enjoying too much to care.

 _I need this,_ something in her begged.  _It's almost what it's like to be happy._

"Although I don't think you missed much when you weren't able to try out, Jesse," Rhoda said. "Ash usually has a few lines and I just act all lovey-dovey around him."

The crew had thought Ash being the nanny bunny's love interest wouldn't work. The audience might identify him too much with his Disney movie, happily married to his princess.

But Rhoda acted her "crush" on him as puppy love. Ash treated her in the cartoons like an older brotherly figure.

It was "Disney" enough to make people happy.

"I missed out on a lot of things," Jesse quietly said, still looking at her.

Her rabbit ears cocked into question marks. Jesse had always been like a rose. He was a myriad of layers underneath. The same could be said for his tone.

"I still remember you like carrot cake, though," he said.

Rhoda felt her heart sank. She looked away, already pushing her plate.

"No," she grimaced.

He looked surprised when she rubbed her nose as if ridding the smell.

"Why?"

Rhoda frowned on her lap. It was one of the ways Jared showed his love, baking her a carrot cake. It was what convinced her that he loved her despite his… flings. Until she found out that he would also bake carrot cakes for them too.

"I just don't anymore," she almost whispered, unable to look at him.

It was sweet of Jared to know how to bake carrot cakes. But looking back at it now, it seemed to be more for his ego than for her or the women that he would bake them for.

Silence enveloped them. She felt guilty when it struck her that Jesse must be thinking that he just ruined the mood. She was about to lighten up the ambiance but he spoke first.

"It's alright, Rhoda." He quietly said, touching her side of the table. "If you won't tell, I won't ask."

She nodded, relieved to let things be. "Thanks, Jesse."

_Even though some would do things for Jared-_

She gasped, her eyes widening.

"ExcusemeIgottago!" She rushed out of the dining room. Then returned back. "I'llhelpyouwiththedishesJesseThankyouThedinnerwasgreat!"

"Rhoda, wait! The storm-"

But a puff of dust only remained where she had been.

"No, Jacques. Stay!" she told her dog, slamming the door behind her. She might've heard him whine but she was already out of Jesse's yard.

Six blocks away, she stopped, entering a sole phone booth. She could've borrowed Jesse's phone but she didn't want him to overhear.

There was something about Jared that she needed to tell Edna.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To those who haven't know it yet, Ash is the guy version of Cinderella. Holiday hassles have come and go. Happy Holidays, everyone.


	4. Secrets Had Been Suppressed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The good thing about holidays is that I can post frequently. New year's eve is almost here, everyone. Hope you're enjoying your vacations.
> 
> To the guest reviewer: That would be funny. But we'll never know ;)

**Chapter 4: Secrets Had Been Suppressed**

After talking to an operator, the phone finally rang on the other end of the line.

"Hello?" Edna's voice crackled.

"Edna? It's me, Rhoda." She paused. "I hope I'm not bothering you and Doris."

There was a huff. "I don't always bring Doris here to break the bed."

Rhoda reddened. She had always planned to get intimate after she got married. But in their fifth year together, she caved in under the the pressure of not wanting Jared to stray.

_Sometimes it felt like it's the only times I've pleased him,_  she exhaled.

In their rounds of intimacy, Jared would lay, satisfied and smirking. "I guess it's true what they say about rabbits."

Rhoda had always been bothered by his words. But it was one of the few compliments that he would give her. Making love to him was exhausting in a way that made her emotionally empty. It didn't matter who was at the top or in the bottom. Jared would just take and take and take.

"Don't you mean, 'make the bed'?" she joked over her queasiness. "How else would Doris sleep there if there's only one?"

"Why're you calling?" Edna asked. There was some shuffling as though tugging the phone out from under the papers.

"I," she hesitated. "I think I got something about Jared." She took a deep breath and anxiously twirled her rabbit ear. "I maybe wrong though."

The sky rumbled, but it was muffled by the closed door of the phone booth.

"Do you or do you not trust yourself?" Edna asked. Despite its bite, there was an air of patience in her tone.

Rhoda closed her eyes. Edna was right.  _Jared isn't here anymore to tell me that he's right and I'm wrong_.

"There have been fans who would do things for him." She bit her lip. "Even without his asking to."

She looked out of the booth's glass, too distracted to see the light rain.

"His creator is one of them, Lancy Lupin." She sat down on the booth's dirty floor, huddled up in one corner. "She was the one who introduced me to Jared."

Lancy Lupin. She and Rhoda met in a whodunit club. While Rhoda loved the heroic appeal of detectives, Lancy liked the noir narratives for them.

She put a hand over her eyes. "She would always do things for Jared. Like drawing him a car." Rhoda gave an exhausted laugh. "Once, she even wanted a key to our home because she said she specialized in background design."

Her fingers entwined tighter on the phone cord. She could still remember how Lancy would wrap her hand intimately on Jared's arm. Lancy would cling to him while talking down at her as if to remind Rhoda to whom Jared really belonged to.

A long time ago, Jared won Rhoda's sympathy when he confided that his creator was obsessed with him.

Her eyes widened in a flash of insight. If Jared never wanted to be with anyone and if Lancy couldn't have him, Lancy would still want to control his choices. By introducing him to someone that would give him an edge but wouldn't love.

"Rhoda?" Edna's voice broke with static. "Are you there?"

She snapped out of her excruciating insight. "Y-yes." She took a deep breath, getting a feeling she was about to rock the boat. "Remember when someone vandalized my trailer?"

After she had broken up with Jared, he spilled his "broken heart" to the press. Rhoda found her trailer splattered with words that would make her mother take out her rifle. One of the slurs was calling her a horned hare. Rhoda was pretty sure they meant horned.

Edna said they were probably toons to be able to paint that fast without the security noticing.

"Well… something else happened after that."

Rhoda took a deep breath before taking a plunge, the sound of falling downpour becoming a comforting lull.

_She washed her hands in the sink._

_It had been days since her trailer was taken away for repairs._

_Looking at herself in the mirror, Rhoda tried to straighten up her wilted ears. Another bag of hate mail just came in. One of the envelopes had a small packet of paint remover. She could have opened that by accident._

_After that incident, CB had human employees screen toon fanmail._

_She looked up when the door of the comfort room closed with a click._

" _Hello," Rhoda said with a friendly smile. The newcomers were human girls. Which was odd, because they were in the segregated bathroom for toons._

" _Are you lost? I'll be happy to show you to the john for humans," she said._

_One of them stopped. But the other walked forward, the third one following suit._

" _Rhoda Rabbit, right?" said the girl who had walked forward._

" _Yes?" she asked, puzzled. There were posters everywhere in Maroon Cartoon Studios, showing everyone who they were._

_She felt uneasy when they surrounded her, blocking the door._

" _You're the one who dumped Jared," one of the girls said._

_They stepped forward, too close for comfort. Rhoda stepped back._

" _What? Enjoying_ married  _Mr. Ash too well?"_

" _Whore."_

_Rhoda flinched when the girl pushed her back. One of them took out a pail from the closet and put it under a running faucet._

" _You're a whore, aren't you?"_

" _Now, wait a minute-" she didn't realize she had walked backward into a stall. They slammed the door close._

" _Hey!" she cried, trying to get it opened. It was jammed. Her heart raced. If she tried to zoom out to escape, she might hurt them by accident. "P-p-p-please!"_

_She heard the faucet stopped. Then whispering._

" _1...2...3!"_

_She yelped when water cascaded down at her._

" _Ow!" she yelled when the bucket followed, bouncing off her head._

_Their laughter echoed in the tiled room, loud and cutting. The door of the comfort room opened and slammed closed again._

_Bewildered, she wrapped her arms around herself, water dripping down her ears._ No, people couldn't be that-

_Her vision blurred and trembled with her. She felt her face twist and she fought for control, willing for her heaving chest to even. Her ears felt like leads. But they swept for sounds, making sure they were gone._

_She crawled out from under the stall door and shook the water out of her fur. Her hands squeezed her ears dry. Then the hems of her dress. The hand dryer roared while she stood underneath it._

_Rhoda faced the mirror, leaning against the sink. She continued to breath in and out, similar to what actors would do in case of stage fright._

_Getting out of the comfort room, she returned to the set with a smile that she barely felt at all. If she told anyone, the filming would get delayed and they were already behind schedule because of her._

_The filming that day was practically a flop because Rhoda couldn't focus._

_She sighed, dragging herself to Mina's trailer. Since she couldn't stay in her own trailer, she had no choice but to trouble Mina. If Mina found out what happened, she would go berserk. Rhoda didn't want that._

_She suddenly hid when she saw Jared appeared out of an alleyway._

" _Thanks for the lovely surprise," he said, straightening his suit jacket._

_Rhoda watched someone else come out after him, arranging back her disheveled hair. Her eyes widened when she recognized the leader of the girls back in the comfort room._

_She zoomed off, not caring if they saw her._

"I've always told myself it's not real as long as I didn't see it," Rhoda said after she had told her story. She could hear the wind howl from afar.

There was more to it. But she didn't think Edna needed to hear it.

_That evening, since she was still staying with Mina, she had to walk a long way to a phone booth._

_She finally spotted one, dusty from neglect, surrounded by mansions who had no use for it._

_Locking the booth's door, she dialled the phone and told the operator where to connect the call -the place where the Disney princes were staying while doing their tour._

_Her lips were already trembling by the time someone answered on the other end._

" _Hello?" Ash's familiar voice spoke, excruciatingly comforting._

_She gritted her teeth, trying to control her breathing around the lump in her throat. Her shaking hands clenched the phone tighter, gripping it like a lifeline._

" _Hello?" Ash asked again._

_Warm tears dripped down her cheeks, finally free._

" _A-Ash, hello." Her nose itched and she pinched it before she could snivel._

" _Rhoda?" he asked, surprise. "What…? Are you crying?"_

_She shook her head hard even though he couldn't see her. Yet her sob broke out at his concern. She was already bothering Mina by her need for shelter. She couldn't bother more people like Ash. It was why Jared hated her. He was right. She was taxing and onerous._

" _I'm so sorry," she wiped her eyes. "I-I'm fine."_

" _Rhoda..."_

_She could hear the pain in his voice that told her they both know she was lying._

_Gripping the phone, she sat into a corner of the phone booth with her knees pulled close to her head. Her rabbit ears covered her and the phone, shielding them both from the world._

" _Can we just talk about something happy?" she strained, feeling the seams holding her together fray and tauten . "P-p-p-please?"_

_After a pause, Ash obliged. Rhoda sat curled into the grimy floor of the phone booth as he recalled happier times in the dim cover of lamplights._

Rhoda straightened up from where she sat in the booth's corner. She looked around, realizing she was in the same position as she had been in the night she had called Ash.

"Edna?" she asked, when she realized that the other end got quiet.

"Are you out of your mind?!" Edna burst out.

Rhoda extended the phone away from her, dumbstruck.

"You could've told Maroon! You could've told the security! You could've told ME!"

"I'm sorry!" Rhoda said, pulling back the phone. Lightning struck. "They're just young women who wanted to prank me-"

"You were assaulted!" she roared. From afar, thunder boomed.

Rhoda quailed in the corner of the booth. "I'm sorry!" She could feel herself beginning to hyperventilate, Jared's eyes looking at her with contempt.

"No, I-" Edna sighed, deflated. "No, Rhoda. I'm not angry at you." There was a popping sound of a jellybean container being opened. "I'm angry  _for_  you."

"I'm sorry," Rhoda murmured again, feeling weight at how much she had affected Edna. Everything she touched, she hurt. Jared. Mina. Ash.

The rain thundered harder than before. She hoped it would stop soon.

"If I hadn't broken up with Jared-"

"If he stopped his liaisons, if he wanted your relationship to work as much as you do, then none of this would've happened," Edna bit, tough and hard. Then she huffed, her voice softening. "Not all of this is your fault, Rhoda."

Rhoda was too struck at her rare tone to respond.

"It's not too late to report what they did to you," she continued.

"It's just a few fan girls, Edna."

"Doesn't erase the fact that there are people out there who are willing to hurt you."

Rhoda felt the phone booth shift. "Edna, I- whoa!"

"What? What happened?" Edna's voice crackled as Rhoda finally look around.

The phone booth was floating underwater. Everything was underwater. She stepped back as water leaked through the door.

"Just a little rain, Edna! I got to go," she said before hanging up.

Taking a deep breath, she opened the door.

Water rushed in. Rhoda was slammed back by the force, feeling the ache that she couldn't shake off.


	5. Regrets Had Been Reinforced

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rhoda goes into an Odd-yssey.

**Chapter 5: Regrets Had Been Reinforced**

She swam away from the floating phone booth. She was still in the suburbs. Hamburgers, sandwiches and other foodstuffs swam like schools of fish, each having a peeper. Long green stalks with eyeballs float around.

 _See-weed and see-food?_  She wondered.

She paddled up for the surface, her head breaking out of the water.

Lightning cracked. Icy sheets of rain poured with the howling winds. A bathtub lurched in the rocky waves and Rhoda managed to climb over it.

"J-j-j-jeepers," she stuttered, her teeth chattering.

She looked around, trying to find out where she was.

_Doesn't erase the fact that there are people out there who are willing to hurt you._

Thunder boomed, startling her. She clutched the edge of the tub. In the torrid downpour, she could barely see a thing. Fog swirled around her like ghosts of dead women. The wind whistled high and wild, she could almost hear voices.

" _Find her, find her_

_Tie her to a pole and tear_

She looked around wildly, trying to find where the singing was coming from.

_Her liver to slivers-"_

She frowned, baffled. "Do I have a liver?"

"- _Drag her to a hole until she_

_Wakes up, looks up_

_Screaming, sees above her,_

_smiling Jared_ "

Thunder boomed like a sledgehammer crushing walls. She startled and a shadow loomed behind her. Turning around, the last thing she saw was a giant wave coming down at her.

The bathtub capsized. Her head broke out of the raging waters. She gasped, paddling to stay afloat. Long see-weeds wrapped around her limbs, trying to drag her down.

The fogs whirled with the screaming wind.

" _Find her, find her-"_

Her arms strained against the weeds. It tangled around her feet.

" _Tie her to a pole and tear_

_Her liver to slivers_

_Drag her to a hole until she-"_

She tried to scream for help but she only swallowed mouthfuls of water.

" _Wakes up, looks up_

_Screaming, sees above her,_

_smiling Jared_ "

A ginormic wave crashed down at her and she finally sank. Stunned, she floated in the cold. She struggled weakly against the weeds.

 _This feels familiar,_  she sluggishly thought.

It felt like her last day of filming before the next one would begin in autumn.

Rhoda had once again been called to CB's office. When she got there, Jared was also waiting for her.

CB tried to convince her to get back with Jared. She couldn't understand why Rhoda was still refusing when Jared was so willing to mend their relationship.

" _Think of your rep, Rhoda!_ " CB had said with exasperation, " _And stop your expensive nonsense. We're already behind the budget because of you!_ "

She remembered not being able to look at Jared. Not after seeing him with the girl in the alley.

Jared was smirking at her. Either way, he would win. She was his to use or his to dispose.

She was trapped.

Trapped.

 _No wonder it's so familiar._ Unnoticed, the weeds loosened as she floated.

The deep waters were blissfully still. Her vision hazed.

Shadows moved. Her eyes widened slightly and she reached out.

_Mater? Pater?_

Her human parents had never liked Jared. Her mother said he was too coquettish for a man. Rhoda explained that Jared was only that way because he wanted her to like him. Her mother only pressed her lips together in disgust.

Jared had always guilted her from visiting them in the holidays, pointing out that her parents were trying to tear them apart. When they passed away in an accident, she clung more to him.

Now, she wondered if she had tried to stay in their later years together because she was afraid of being alone.

Was she crying? She couldn't tell underwater.

_You must've hate me. I'm sorry._

Her parents' shadowy forms moved in the ocean. The water surrounding her felt comforting, a love that was everywhere and filling her.

Rhoda could hear them singing, this time softly familiar and warm.

" _There is one thing that we must say to you_

_As you face the dance of strife_

_Always we'll be watching over you_

_As you sail the sea of life"_

Her eyes burned. She reached out for them and they disappeared, broken by a massive dog diving into the water.

_Jacques?_

He paddled for her and bit the nape of her collar. With Rhoda secured, he swam for the surface.

The torrential rain continued to fall in sheets. Jacques was practically dragging her to shallow ground. By accident or by luck, he heavily landed on her torso, causing her to belch out all the water she had swallowed. Rhoda gratefully gasped for air, hacking and coughing.

He barked loudly. She blearily turned back to see the flood receding. The suburbs looked the same, except for the draped see-weeds tangled everywhere.

"Poor, unfortunate souls," she hoarsely whispered, her voice cracking from the water.

Then she turned. Her eyes widened at what was left of her tent in the continuous downpour of the storm.

"MY poor, unfortunate soul!"

She stumbled into standing and tried to run, about to salvage what she could.

"Rhoda!"

She hacked out the remaining water in her throat. Her ears tried to wipe away the rain from her eyes. But she could still see a familiar silhouette. A silhouette similar to Jared. The only reason she wasn't screaming in horror after the creepy song she had heard, was that she knew Jared wouldn't be caught standing in the rain. It would ruin his hair.

"Jesse?" she said, more in surprise. She was sure she looked like a soggy shipwreck, but Jesse in his trench raincoat and hat looked like a modern divinity braving the elements. He alone was making the pouring rain looked cinematic.

She yelped when he carried her up, drenched and all.

"Thank goodness," he murmured, gripping her close with her head tucked under his chin.

Rhoda was too shocked and too cold to feel their proximity. Thunder boomed. He broke away a little to look at her. "Are you alright?" he asked, wiping her bangs away from her eyes.

Her mind snapped back to her belongings. "My tent!" she yelled, pointing at what remained of her camping site.

He shook his head. "I got your suitcase. Let's go."

Her teeth were chattering as soon as they entered the house.

"S-s-s-sorry," she shivered, numbly aware of the puddles her fur must be dripping.

"No worries," he replied, closing the door. He carried her upstairs without stopping. The chill robbed her of her boundaries, making her lean against his chest for warmth.

He opened a door to a bathroom.

She hugged herself when he put her into the bathtub and turned on the hot water faucet.

"Thank you," she sighed.

Slowly, Rhoda relaxed. Her rabbit ears hung low on her back and floated lazily in the water. Still, she shivered. She rubbed her arms as she watched the wispy steam rose out of the hot water.

"Where did the storm came from?" she asked.

"Bald Mountain of Disney's Fantasia."

She paused. "That would explain a lot."

He began to unbutton his dripping trenchcoat. "Don't you know there's a storm?"

She shook her head as he took it off. True to his ridiculously perfect tooniness, mud didn't even tarnished his shoes. His hair got wet. But it looked slicked and smooth.

To her dismay, the front of his suit jacket and shirt still got soaked. Probably from her sopping fur when she had leaned above the neckline of his coat.

The memory of Jesse hugging her flashed in her mind. Guilt weighed down on her as she realized how much she had worried him.

She patted the water. "Why don't you join me?"

They both stilled, digesting what she had said.

Her ears exploded with steam. "I mean, you must be cold!" Water splashed about as she gestured around, no longer freezing. "You got me out of the rain and you've gotten wet and there's room in the tub and-"

She sank deeper into the water. "I'm sorry," she gurgled.  _For not helping with dinner. For running out of dinner. For worrying you. For making you wet. For-_

Jesse chuckled. "Just think that we're even," he referred to his accidental innuendo back then. He stepped out of the bathroom, still looking amused. "I'll try to find something for you to wear."

Rhoda face-planted into the water as soon as the door closed behind him.

_For being your problem._

**XOXOXO**

She wondered what would her mother think.

Rhoda was standing in Jesse's laundry room, wearing nothing but his black button-down shirt of his signature suit.

She could barely get Jacques to sit still as she blow dry his fur with a hair dryer. He was constantly leaping at her and making a whining, howling sound.

Her hands scratched behind his ears, cupping his face. "I'm here, Jacques. I'm alright."

The washing machine hummed with her clothes, including the ones in her suitcase. She pointed the hair dryer to his fur again as she pondered.

 _I could've gone to toon heaven._ She tugged Jesse's shirt closer to herself.

Jacques nuzzled her when she threw her arms around him. "You saved me, ol' boy." She rubbed his back with full circles. "Thank you so much."

Contrary to popular belief, toons can "die". But they just end up in flowing robes with a harp and wings, floating away to live in the clouds above ToonTown.

She let Jacques licked her face. "I must've gotten you worried." The hair dryer fluffed his fur. "I'm sorry."

Her thoughts wondered to her dreamlike-drowning. Disney animation had a lot of special effects that would last with everything they would draw. She had a feeling its Fantasia quality played tricks with her subconscious.

"Mater," she spoke, tasting the words that she hadn't uttered for a long time. "Pater."

Back when they were still together, Jared had always said she was lucky to be in a relationship.

" _Who's going to have you?"_ he asked, gesturing the rest of her.

She knew that her parents loved her. Never mind that she was a toon and they were humans. But they couldn't accept her being with Jared. That thought had discouraged her more from visiting them.

Maybe she didn't deserve to be loved, being an ungrateful daughter.

After they died in a car accident, her remorse tripled, reinforcing her assumption.

But back there, when she was drowning and seeing shadows of her parents…

 _You're always imagining things,_ Jared would say when she would ask about the woman that he was with last night.

Maybe it was all in her head. But it had shown her what she had always known deep inside despite her regrets.

 _Do you or do you not trust yourself?_  Edna's voice spoke in her mind.

Rhoda put a hand on her chest, mulling.

Thunder rumbled outside, making her look up.

She touched the glass window, looking at the cottage with dismay. She had boarded the windows. But the heavy leaks from the ratty roof was continuing to damage the flooring that they had just installed.

She also owe Mina a new set of camping gear which was most likely destroyed by the storm.

Her head thumped the glass, wondering what to do next.

**XOXOXO**

Jesse looked up when he saw Jacques and Rhoda come out of the laundry room. She was back in her signature overalls dress.

"How're you feeling?" he asked.

"I'm alright," she said, straightening her bow tie. She missed the warmth of his shirt. But what would Jesse think if he still saw her wearing it like a coat?

"The guest room's prepared for you."

"I-" she bit her lip, "-that's generous of you, Jesse. Thank you."

His head tilted to the side as he watched her cross the room. She hopped on the window sill and peeped through the glass. The rain was still pounding on.

"Like I said before, you can stay here while you fix the house."

Her ears drooped. She was hoping this conversation wouldn't happen.

"If your trailer is in good condition, you would've used it a long time ago," he continued.

She turned to face him, wondering how much did he know. Or was perceiving.

Her trailer had been repaired and repainted. The problem was, she didn't want crazy fans finding her by her plate number. But now, she didn't have a choice.

She couldn't stay at Mina's place. That would be like accepting defeat. Ash didn't even know where she was right now.

"You couldn't be thinking about camping again," Jesse said, as if reading her mind. "What if there's another storm?"

Her hands gripped the hems of her dress. She would have to get her trailer back.

"Rhoda."

She practically jumped to see Jesse in front of her. He swept back his bangs as he looked into her eyes.

"It's fine." His hands landed lightly on her shoulders. "Just let me do this for you."

He let her go when she looked at the storm again, her rabbit ears drooping. Behind her, her cottontail wilted.

_I was going to prove Jared wrong. I'm not anyone's problem!_

Her chest deflated with a sigh.  _Instead..._

Circumstances got her pinned by the wrists. Her stupid decisions got her pinned by the wrists. Jesse got her pinned by the wrists.

She hastily shredded the image in her head.  _Jeepers, that's so wrong!_

Rhoda faced him again, hoping that her face wasn't red. Her lips quirked into a grateful smile, covering her own disappointment towards herself.

"Thank you, Jesse. I owe you big." She resisted the urge to touch her shoulders where his hands had been. It felt cold when he had let go.

Instead, she glanced at Jacques, who was allowing Ronnie to groom his head.

Rhoda petted them both. "This might be too much to ask," she glanced up at Jesse, "but can Jacques sleep with me on the bed?"  _He keeps the bad thoughts away,_  she didn't add.

She hugged Jacques, burying her face into his fur with a sigh. Her heavy eyes closed for a moment and everything went black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's the last update for this year. I can't promise when the next one will come up.
> 
> What do you guys think of Rhoda's Odd-yssey? Poor Jesse, having to deal with a mess of a rabbit.
> 
> All of the songs in this chapter are inspired by "The Mariner's Revenge Song" by the talented The Decemberists.


	6. Dreams Had Been Dashed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Horror crept in her the moment Ash saw that she was living with someone that look like her ex. His smile vanished the same way she had laughed and told them that Jared’s pet name for her was dummy bunny.

**Chapter 6: Dreams Had Been Dashed**

Ash looked out of his pumpkin carriage. A humdrum blur of suburbs passed by through the window. But he wasn't seeing any of that. His thoughts were far too deep in his last conversation with Rhoda.

_She sniffed and Ash could picture her wiping her eyes with her ear._

" _Thank you, Ash. I'm feeling better already."_

_There was a shuffling sound of her dress. "I got to go. Mina might be-"_

" _Rhoda," he spoke out. She still hadn't told him what was wrong. Maybe she didn't want to. Nevertheless, he wanted to give her a parting comfort._

_So he sang._

"No matter how your heart is breaking

If you keep on believing

A dream is a wish that comes true"

_There was silence on the other end. Then a sniff. Then a longer sniff, the type that would prevent snot from dripping._

_Ash slightly held the phone away when a loud bawl erupted in the other end. The sound of knees crashed on the ground as sobbing followed after._

He sighed, covering his eyes.

Frost White touched his arm. "We're almost there."

**XOXOXOXO**

She and Jesse had settled into a comfortable routine.

The air felt filtered with sunflowers, all bright and yellow. An old timey music from the radio mingled with the smell of toast.

A crossword puzzle from the newspaper lay flat on the table. Long, dexterous fingers twirled a pencil leisurely as a book slammed closed.

"Jesse, why didn't you tell me I spelled 'happy, wrong?" Rhoda asked exasperatedly, waving around a dictionary.

He looked up from the newspaper, a smile held back in cool eyes.

"I wondered what would happen to the other answers if we spelled it your way," he replied with a casual shrug.

Rhoda's pout slowly turned into a dawning beam. "That's brilliant!" she said, pointing her pencil at him.

Ignoring the rest of the clues for "across" and "down", they filled out the crossword with their own words instead.

"You're making that up," Rhoda said in awe, watching him write down a word that conveniently filled out an impossible array of blanks and letters.

"Check the dictionary if you want."

She grabbed the book and the dictionary laughed at her before giving her the meaning.

Jesse patted her back as she shamefully put it away.

 _This is actually nice,_  she thought as she gave him a self-deprecating grin.

Rhoda had always been a creature of habits. But after a week of staying with Jesse, she made a few adjustments.

Jesse would usually wake up around ten. So she changed to making brunch before that hour. Late mid mornings had became her favorite part of the day. Because she got to catch up with Jesse after his late night work in the club.

She went back to working on the cottage. The storm really did a number on it, delaying its finish date.

There were perks in living with Jesse. His cat, Ronnie, wouldn't be left alone because Rhoda would be there to check on her and keep her company while he was away..

Rhoda was determined to pay back his generosity. She would clean up when she could. She made sure he got lunch to bring to his gigs. She would be fast asleep when he would get home, but she would leave dinner for him just in case.

It almost made her feel like-

 _A friend who's being helpful,_  she firmly told herself. She shut down the rest of her unacknowledged thoughts, focusing instead, to the comfortable silence enveloping them.

Rhoda caught Jesse's eyes and grinned. He quietly smiled back, following her lead as she filled the boxes in the crossword puzzle to form a picture of a kitten.

 _This must be what living together feels like,_ she idly sighed, resting her chin on her hand.

Her eyes widened at what she had just thought.  _WHAT THE-_

Jesse looked at her with concern as she vigorously ruffled her own hair. "Are you alright?"

She grinned at him through her bangs, aware that her hair must've looked like a thrashed haystack.

"I'm fine… uh, my brain itches?" she replied sheepishly.

Rhoda turned away before he could respond, smoothing back her hair.

 _What's wrong with me?_  Living with Jesse was like a double edged sword for her.

She looked out of the window, thankful that he couldn't see her face.  _This is what it should've been with Jared_ , a part of her unwantedly pointed out.

Last time she had been enjoying a brunch with Jesse, she got scared of her own mind when it tried to imagine Jared's rich violet eyes on Jesse.

She rubbed her arm, feeling her fur stood on its end.  _Never again…._

They both looked up when they heard the clopping of hooves. Then a pumpkin-shaped carriage passed by the window.

"What the-" she climbed over the sink and stuck her head out of the window. Her mouth hung open when it stopped in front of the cottage.

A head poke out of the carriage window, his hair as dark as ebony. "Is this the place?"

Rhoda fell out of the window and landed on the concrete below. "Guys?" she exclaimed in disbelief.

The carriage clopped backwards, Rhoda didn't even want to think how. It stopped in front of Jesse's home and she ran towards the pumpkin carriage.

"Guys!"

The door opened. Woodland creatures and glorious light spilled out.

Rhoda shielded her eyes from Disney's conventional concept of beauty.

Frost White first came out. Skin as white as snow, lips as red as blood and hair as dark as ebony. People said he was drawn with unwavering kindness that lasted after his movie. She couldn't deny that fact.

Stepping outside next was Aurelius. Rhoda met him a few times. He had a tendency to be dreamy and was pretty good with sewing

Then Ash came out. Before she could even think, he went straight for her with a hug.

"Ash," she said in surprised. She knew Ash would hug a stranger. But the enveloping concern she could feel around her had thrown her off-course.

"Are you okay?" he asked, breaking apart from where he was kneeling. Jacques scampered towards them, sniffing curiously at Ash with a wag of his tail.

Before she could answer, Frost and Aurelius surrounded her.

"How're you?" Aurelius asked, giving her a hug.

She hugged back. When they broke apart, Rhoda could see a measuring tape in his hands from where it had encircled around her waist. Frost and Ash craned over to look at the measurement.

"Are you sleeping well?" Aurelius asked, looking up with concern. "You might drop at a prick of a needle."

"Are you eating well?" Frost asked, kneeling in front of her to check for signs of gauntness. His touches were light and soft, far from her heavy-handed clumsiness. "Do you want an apple?"

He gave her a brief hug of greeting. "Your child-bearing hips won't be able to hide your lack of appetite."

Shorts blasts of steam hooted out of her ears. "I'm fine, guys!," she exclaimed, instantly covering her face.

"I thought that was the correct address," Ash said, smiling. He scratched Jacques behind the ears. The dog ran off when the sparrows and robins began to use him as a perch.

She chuckled. "It is, but I'm staying here for a while."

The front door creaked open. "Rhoda?"

Horror crept in her upon seeing the change in Ash's smile. It vanished the same way she had laughed and told them that Jared's pet name for her was dummy bunny.

"Jesse!" she turned, prioritizing introductions first. "This is Ash, my co-star in The Baby Mina show."

She turned to Ash and was glad that his face was back to its graceful smile.

"And this is Frost White and Aurelius," she said, grabbing both of their hands and swinging herself to Jesse's side like a little kid.

She bounced a bit and gave a window-washer wave. "And this is Jesse! He's just like you guys!"

Silence fell around them that Rhoda couldn't decipher. She remembered asking Mina one time why people wouldn't treat Jesse like they would treat Ash, Frost and Aurelius.

" _Let me put it this way," Mina said after a long thought. "The Disney Princes are a romantic kind of fantasy. Jesse however..." Her face morphed into anything but innocent. "...is another kind of fantasy."_

"It's nice to meet you, Jesse," Ash spoke first, holding out his hand.

Before Jesse could shake it, Frost and Aurelius greeted him with hugs. Rhoda glanced at Jesse for a moment. She knew that despite intimacy that his role would demand on stage, Jesse liked his personal space.

Jesse responded back with his polite stage smile, his arms briefly giving them a hug.

A hand touched her far shoulder. "Do you want to show us around?" Ash asked.

Rhoda beamed. "Certainly! It's Jesse's day-off and he'll be helping me with the cottage."

Ash's smile looked frozen but he allowed himself to be steered towards Rhoda's actual house.

"My," Frost said, holding out a finger for a bluebird to perch on. "This has far more room of improvement than the dwarves' home."

"Watch out for the thorns," Aurelius said, "Even Philia c-" his head started to nod.

"Aurelius!" Rhoda scurried to his side. But the owl on his shoulder nudged him awake.

"I'm fine, dear," he said, patting her head. "Don't worry, he was trained for my narcolepsy." The owl hooted with agreement.

"Why this place, Rhoda?" Ash asked.

She smiled. "I wanted to fix it."

Much to her confusion, Frost, White and Aurelius nodded to each other. Frost opened his mouth and vocalized a melody.

All birds, rabbits, deers and other woodland creatures rushed toward them. Rhoda understood what they were going to do when they swarmed around.

"Waaaaiiiitt!" she yelled, jumping on top of the cottage.

All motion stopped. She spread her arms to Ash and the others. "P-p-p-please, guys. Thank you but I just want to fix this on my own."

She suddenly yelled when the tattered roof collapsed where she was standing.

"Rhoda!"

Dust floated in her star-spinning vision. Dimly, she heard a door slam open.

"Rhoda!"

She tried to get up, putting a facade over her anxiety.

_Is my tooning back? If not, what if I broke something?_

Jesse was suddenly on her side. "Are you alright?" he asked, moving aside her bangs so that he could see her face better.

It was more like a shock. She wiggled her toes. Slightly moved her limbs in a way that she hoped wouldn't be noticed.

 _Thank goodness, I didn't break a leg_. She sprang up into standing with a grin.

"Don't worry, Jesse! I have a natural big cushion," she said, glancing at the others who were watching them. "Hey guys, I'm okay."

Ash looked up to the hole she had made on the ceiling. "Why do you want to fix this by yourself?"

Rhoda deflated, twiddling her fingers. "I.."

The silence stretched and her mind raced for a  _normal_ excuse.

"I..."

"Excuse me," Frost hovered over to Jesse. "Can we get some ice for our dear friend?"

Jesse gave Rhoda one last glance before going with Frost. Aurelius nodded at Ash before following them out.

"Now then." Ash knelt down to Rhoda's level. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I didn't break something, I swear." She looked up at the sunlight spilling down from the large hole on the roof.  _Except..._

"Why do you want to fix this house all by yourself?" he asked. "You know we can do it quickly."

She glanced first at the closed door before sighing.

"Jared always said my hobby for tinkering and making stuff is too quaint," she explained. Jared actually had said something else but Ash didn't need to know that.

_He shrugged off the bomber jacket that he had been modelling. "It's too barnyard, people would think you grew up in a farm."_

" _I did live in a farm,_ "  _she pointed out._

_His eyes glared irritably "What? Are you still living in one right now?" he asked sharply._

_She withered, looking away. "No," she answered in a small voice._

"So I want to fix this house to feel like myself again," she continued.

She remembered how Pater and Mater would always fix and clean things when they wanted to clear their minds. But after her first dinner with Jesse...

 _You haven't been yourself lately_ , he had said.

"I want to be myself again," she said.  _Without repercussions of what Jared would think._

Ash rubbed his chin, "Hmm..."

He glanced at the house. "You want to be yourself again," he thoughtfully echoed. He swept her bangs to the side like an older brother fixing his younger sibling's hair. "Well, how do you feel?"

"About what?"

"About yourself."

He got his answer upon seeing the look she had given to the ground. "Not so good, huh?" A bird as blue as his eyes chirped sympathetically.

"You don't always have to be the funny bunny all time." He chuckled a little, patting her shoulder. "When you're upset, you always leave."

Rhoda lifted her hands before dropping them with a sigh. "How can I help people if I don't feel good?"

"Do you want to feel good right now?" he asked. "About being yourself?" The blue bird nodded eagerly.

She hesitated at the sight of his grin. Then she she beamed, realizing where he was coming from.

"Yeah!" She held up a hammer and a screwdriver. "I'm gonna make my own nail gun!"

The blue bird flew away frantically.

He lowered her tools. "In an enclosed room where nobody could get hurt," he hastily supplied. "I'm talking about making a change."

"What kind of change?"

He smiled, the world becoming a little bit brighter.

"A makeover."

Her eyes widened. She felt like a deer caught in headlights. Makeovers just reminded her of everything that was wrong of her. Jared always said she should dress like her age and avoid saying words that begin with the letter "p" because of her stutter.

" _Everyone agrees with me that you look crazy,_ " Jared had said.

"Ash," she began, "I don't think I should..."

He poked her gently on the forehead. "Rhoda, tinkering is good, especially when you have your own place." He glanced at the cottage then at Jesse's house. "Before you can feel like yourself again, you have to feel good about yourself first."

She thought for a moment. "Alright, what do I have to do?"

**XOXOXOXOX**

"Ash!" she gasped before she slipped back into a tub of full body shampoo. "Do I really have to - _glub glub glub._ "

"Of course," Ash said over the dividing section as he read a magazine. "How do you think Aurelius maintains his hair?"

"But-"

A stylist toon massaged conditioner on her shoulders and Rhoda tried to keep her eyes from closing in bliss.

She lost.

**XOXOXOXOX**

An hour later, Rhoda came out of the saloon, brushed and blow dried.

"There's our girl!" Ash said. Aurelius gave a wave.

"I thought they put conditioner in every last inch of me," Rhoda answered. Then she reddened. "I was wrong." At least the stylist had asked for her consent her first.

Ash nodded at the sheen of her fur. "Next, clothes."

He didn't lead her by the hand this time. Instead, he waved her over. Before, when they first got to the mall, Rhoda had shrunk back when he held out his hand at her. Ash understood.

"Thread and clothing," Aurelius said with a smile at Ash. "Our specialty."

Rhoda stepped back when they both turned to her with a scrutinizing stare.

"She's all about… fun and playful," Ash thoughtfully commented

Aurelius knelt down and felt the hem of her dress. It was flared but slightly weighted, like the folds of an overalls. "Something that accentuates the swing of her energy, but still modest," he commented. The chipmunks that had followed them squeaked in agreement.

"Guys," Rhoda spoke up, holding up her hands. "Thanks, but I don't want to change my signature clothes."

"We know," Ash said lightly. "Let's go buy underwear."

"Wha-?"

Ash and Aurelius looked at each other. "If you're not comfortable with that-"

"No, it's not that," Rhoda hastily replied. They had went in shopping trips before, including underwear. Until Jared insisted that she should be home straight after work. "But…" Her ears cocked to question mark. "Undies?"

Ash smiled. "You don't need to change your signature clothes. But you can still feel good with what you're wearing in the inside."

"And no cheap set of panties this time," Aurelius advised, cheekily wagging a finger at her. He petted the owl on his shoulder. "Just something you're comfortable with. But stylish."

Her heart twinged. They must all be very busy, yet here they were. She tried to clear the lump in her throat, her smile never faltering.  _Did I make you worr_ y  _that much_?

"We really should be with you," Ash spoke. "Remember when we turned away for one moment and you bought a sweater that was really loud?"

"I couldn't sleep after that," Aurelius said.

"But it got polka dots and stripes and every splash of color imaginable," Rhoda defended.

Ash and Aurelius glanced at each other, eyes wide.

They each took Rhoda's hand. "We should come with you."

**XOXOXOXOX**

The carriage drove back to the suburbs and Rhoda looked out of the window.

"How're the princesses?"

"Still horseback riding and fencing," Aurelius replied, leaning dozily on his seat. "They tend to get all hyped up when they're together."

She glanced at the empty space. "How come Frost White didn't come?"

Ash let the mice helped themselves to a bag of peanuts. "He said he'd rather cook with Jesse."

Rhoda smiled. "That's great! He and Jesse have a lot in common."

Ash and Aurelius briefly glanced at each other. "Really?"

She nodded fervently. "Yeah! They both don't like seeing people get hurt. They're both gentle with their hands," she thought for a moment, "Oh and they're both good at cooking!"

She propped her arms on the window and rested her chin on them. "I just don't get why people don't believe me when I tell 'em," she said. Her eyes absentmindedly gazed outside, not seeing the billboard of Jesse modelling an unbuttoned shirt.

**XOXOXOXOX**

Jesse's house was teeming with forest creatures.

A deer swept with a broom by its antlers. Birds fluttered by, carrying a tablecloth while squirrels polished furniture with their tails. Frost's merry whistling could be heard with the birds' sweet warbling.

Rhoda didn't mind the animals, Frost White had set up his own cleaning company with them after his movie.

Aurelius headed to the living room. She sniffed the heavenly scent of thick soup in the air, her tail wagging in anticipation.

"Rhoda, can I talk to you for a minute?" Ash approached.

Her stomach dropped.

"About what happened," he gently explained. "And I know you're a grown rabbit, but I also want to talk about," he gestured around Jesse's house, "This."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: Screw gender norms. Coming up, Jesse gets to know about Jared. Sorry, I've been taking so long. I've been job hunting.


	7. However...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She sighed, swishing the milk in her glass. “Jesse, do you know a toon named Jared Lupin?”

**Chapter 7: However...**

In the laws of cartoon physics, for every cause there would be an effect.

Drop a mallet? Hole on the ground.

Lit TNT? Kaboom.

Wrong someone? Well...

She followed him to the side of her yard, feeling like a prisoner stepping into her own execution.

Every action, no matter what she would choose, had an equal retaliation.

She looked down, unable to meet his eyes.

"Mina told me everything," Ash started.

"I'm sorry!" she cried.

"Huh?"

"I'm sorry I made you worry so much. I don't want you to get dragged into this mess any further," she prattled, her rabbit ears twisting anxiously. "But you still came, I'm sorry."

"Why're you apologizing for my actions?" Ash asked.  _Oh wait, this is familiar._

He remembered the time they were talking about pet names.

" _Sometimes, I would call Charming as 'pumpkin'," he said, a hand over his heart._

_He tried not to laugh at Mina who looked like she was about to puke. Rhoda laughed._

" _Jared's pet name for me is 'dummy bunny'!"_

_Silence fell as they all look at her._

" _Rhoda, that's not very nice of him._ "

_She frowned at the disapproval in the room. Her hands cupped her elbows defensively. "He was just joking. Besides, I AM a dummy bunny in the show."_

_Mina turned away in disgust. Rhoda's ears wilted._

" _You guys don't know him the way that I do."_

Ash sighed. Rhoda barely talked about Jared after that. "Look, it's not your fault that I came. But I still have to scold you," he gently said.

Rhoda hung her head, allowing herself to be lead to the log that she used to sit on as a bench. "I'm sorry."

He sat down beside her. "You cried on the phone and when I got back, you're just gone. I don't know what's going on so I asked Mina."

She looked away, a dark cloud over her head. "I'm sorry. I don't want to be a burden."

He wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "You're not a burden," he firmly said. "You're our friend."

Rhoda wryly smiled. She stopped hanging out with Ash and Mina after work because Jared wanted her to stay at home.

"Where's Mina?" she asked. She didn't want to sound like she was poking a hole on his statement, but curiosity got the better of her.

Ash exhaled. "She doesn't want to come," he replied, holding back a grimace.

"I see." She shouldn't be surprised. Mina opened her home to her because she was her comedic partner. A long time ago, Mina started acting cold towards her for some reason. Then she started talking to her again. After that, there was a distance between them that she couldn't understand.

When Rhoda stayed with Mina after her break-up, things couldn't be anymore awkward.

"Are you still drinking a lot of coffee?" he asked.

She grinned guiltily. "Last week? But I'm dry now."

In her later years of Jared, coffee didn't let her think. Coffee just let her act with the thrill of a zeal. Rehearse. Act. Smile. Laugh. Go home. Clean. Cook. Crash asleep. Coffee never let her dwell on thoughts to what he was doing so late. Why he didn't tell her. What he thought of her. What was wrong of her.

So she would drink pitchers from the coffee maker machine.

But just like alcohol, it had stronger effects on toons than humans, including its hold.

Ash covered his face and she felt like she had let him down.

"Look, you never wanted to talk about Jared with us," he kindly said. "But you have friends who wouldn't mind hearing you out." Then his tone became dubious. "Even Jesse."

She laughed apprehensively. "C'mon, Ash. Jesse ain't that bad," she said, putting a reassuring hand on his arm.

His brows delicately pulled into a frown. "Did he even eat the carrot cake that you gave him?"

"Ash!" she laughed. "I don't know. That was a long, looooong time ago."

He shook his head but didn't say anything. He had seen Rhoda explode her own kitchen for several days and covered with burnt batter as she poured all her affection to baking her gift.

"By the way, how're you dealing with your coffee addiction?"

Rhoda puffed up her chest proudly. "I've been substituting with jasmine tea!" In truth, she didn't want Jesse to know.

He raised his brow in concern. "Are you sure that's the only thing you're substituting?"

"What do you mean?"

"It's none of my business. But I'm really not comfortable with you living with someone that looks like your ex," he said.

"He's not Jared!" she spoke out.  _Jared would never look for me in the pouring rain._ The very thought hit her with a flash of insight. She put a hand on her forehead, her eyes widening. "Sometimes I wish I'm as happy with Jared as I am with him."

The she burst out. "But I don't want Jesse to be Jared!" She shuddered at the very thought.

They both paused, suddenly aware of the words that came out of her mouth. Ash nodded slowly, spurning Rhoda to wave her hands away.

"It's not like that! Besides, Jesse likes older ladies like Martha Acme."

A thought struck her.  _What if Jesse already has a girlfriend?!_ All this time she had been enjoying her time with someone who was already taken? She was just as bad as Jared!

 _Why didn't I thought of that before?!_  She frantically thought.  _What if she isn't okay with this?_

"The middle-aged woman?" Ash gently but skeptically asked. Acme had died years ago in "The Will War" where she left her land for ToonTown. Many toons visited her funeral, including the whole cast of Maroon Cartoon.

"I had always seen them together," she said, uprighting a beam of reason under her claim.

Ash checked his watch. "It's almost five o'clock."

She cocked her head. "Ooookay?"

He grinned in a way that hadn't been branded in his Disney merchandise. "When are you going to admit that you still got it bad?"

From afar, Aurelius poked his head out of the window when he heard Rhoda's scream of frustration.

Ash chuckled. "See? I didn't just get the role because of my Disney prince status."

"Huh?"

He amiably rolled his eyes a little. "Jared said you told him that I'm not funny... or even witty at all." He tried not to show it but Rhoda could hear the hurt in his voice.

Her mouth hung open. "What?! I never- When did I-?" Had she really said that?

"Back when I started working with you, Jared mentioned it."

"Huh?!" She clutched her hair and rabbit ears.

He searched the shock in her face, his eyes widening. "You never said that, did you?"

She shook head frantically. "I would never!" Her hand covered her mouth. "All this time you treated me nicely even though you thought I think bad of you?" Her eyes stung.

He knelt to her eye level. "No, I should be the one apologizing," he hurriedly said. "Heavens, I never even thought you wouldn't really say that."

Ash sighed, placing the tips of his fingers on his forehead. "I was too focused being graceful at taking the slight, I never considered he might be lying."

"Maybe he just misunderstood about something I said," Rhoda replied, confused.

 _Did we really had that conversation? Or am I being forgetful?_  She tried to imagine the conversation in hopes that the memory would surface.

 _Stop! That's how it begins to feel like a memory._ She groaned, massaging her temples. Ash held her steady.

"Remember my movie?" he asked.

They returned back to Jesse's house. Rhoda tucked a card inside her pocket.

When they opened the door, the house was sparkling clean. Aurelius and the woodland creatures greeted them with a dress in his hands.

"Ta-dah! For you, my dear," he said, showing it to her from collar to hem.

It turned out that Aurelius had whipped out a sewing machine (wearing finger sewing guards in all of his fingers) and made her a dress while she and Ash were talking.

She stared.

It was red with puffed sleeves and a ruffled skirt, tied at the back was a giant bow.

"The skirt flares when you spin," Aurelius said, rubbing his eyes.

Her eyes watered. "Jeepers, it looks like I'd be performing in a children's party," she said, realizing the effort he had made in it to the point that he got tired.

"I love it!" she dreamily sighed. Her eyes sparkled as she floated, swooning towards it

"It's for the Maroon Cartoon Anniversary Ball," Ash said. "Everyone's going to be there."

Her joy deflated and her butt crashed down on the floor. She had entirely forgotten about that. As one of the top toon stars, she was expected to come.

_Jared is going to be there._

Ash touched her shoulder. "Don't worry, Mina and I will be coming too."

**XOXOXOXO**

She and Jesse greeted them goodbye as they stepped back inside the carriage. Rhoda each gave them a peck on the cheek.

Ash gave her one last hug. "Remember, Rhoda. We're here," he whispered in their embrace. Then after a pause, he spoke again. "Perhaps, even him."

She turned around and glanced at Jesse, who was talking with Frost, his genuine smile in his face.

Her hand waved goodbye at the departing carriage.

Did she want Jesse to know?

Her heart stopped for a moment.  _What would you think of me after?_

But her friends were so fast to judge about Jared. They didn't even understand.

"Animals just deep-cleaned our home," Jesse casually said.

She pointedly ignored the word "our". "I know, right?" she chirped, "Wanna celebrate after dinner with milk and cookies?"

**XOXOXOXO**

"See? I knew you'd get along with Frost," Rhoda beamed, carrying a plate of cookies. Jacques bounded after her. In the living room, Ronnie lounged on the sofa, grateful to have her house back.

"He doesn't want to hurt animals so he knew a lot about cooking with vegetables," he replied, placing two glasses of milk on the table.

"I hope he didn't bother you much about it," she said, petting Ronnie. "Frost can be very enthusiastic with sharing."

"I don't mind. I actually asked."

Her ears straightened slightly. "Really?"

"Since you're with me in the time being, I know you prefer a vegetarian diet," he replied, his back turned.

An arrow flew in through the window and directly towards her chest. Rhoda ducked just in time and chucked it back to the trespassing cupid. She closed the window with a firm slam.

"That's so kind of you, Jesse," she smiled. She raised her glass of milk. "A toast!"

Jesse toasted his glass back. She dunked her cookie into the milk, enjoying a few minutes of peace before…

She sighed, swishing the milk in her glass. "Jesse, do you know a toon named Jared Lupin?"

"I worked with him a few times."

Her ears perked in surprise. "You did?"

"Photo shoots for magazine ads. He ignored me the whole time." He turned his nose away. "Fine with me."

"Oh.' She fell silent for a moment.

"I also know he was your long-time boyfriend."

She fell out of the sofa in surprise.

"You do?" she asked from the floor.

He shrugged. "I've seen it for years in magazines that aren't even about gossip," he said, impassive. "Then a chicken told me you have an ex."

Rhoda climbed back on the sofa, carefully watching his face. Jesse sounded more apathetic than usual. She then remembered that he didn't read rags that were obsessed with Hollywood celebrities. Perhaps, she had been silly worrying what Jesse thought of her with Jared's claims in gossip columns.

Jacques put his head on her lap, his tail thumping the floor. Rhoda petted him and looked at Jesse apologetically.

"I know you two looked similar, but I just want you to know I didn't go out with him because he looks like you."

He fell silent, his gaze on Ronnie while he petted her.

"Why him?" he quietly asked.

Rhoda chuckled. "It's a long 'tail'," she said, letting her fingers run down Ronnie's fluffy tail.

Jesse offered her the platter of cookies.

With a wry smile, she began.

" _Jared," Lancy said, "this is my pal, Rhoda Rabbit."_

_She stared at him. He looked painfully familiar… and yet, not._

_A saucy smirk graced his lips, taking her hand. "You know, I usually pick up chicks. But I don't mind picking_ you  _up," he said, tipping up her chin._

_Her forehead wrinkled in confusion. Then with no hesitation, she smashed the mallet on top of her head._

_Both Jared and Lancy stepped back in surprise. Tweeting birds encircled her head and Rhoda gently cupped one._

" _Here," she said, handing the chirpy robin. "I'm sorry it's not a chick though."_

"That was certainly an impression," Jared commented.

"I know, right?" Rhoda said. Then she smiled. "But for some reason, he kept in touch."

_The first dozen roses came during Friday filming. The crew were grinning at her as she took it into her arms._

" _For me?" she asked in surprise, the scent of the roses brushing her nose._

" _Who's J. Lupin?" Mina asked._

" _Lancy's toon." She shrunk back when they all whistled and hooted. "Jeepers, it's not what you think!"_

" _Rhoda's got an admirer!" Dominic teased._

" _He's just a friend of mine."_

" _There's a note in it," Carol said, waving a small envelope._

" _Read it!"_

_Rhoda opened the card, then her face contorted with perplexity._

_Mina snatched it from her hand. "Dearest Rhoda," she read aloud. "I hope your day is as beautiful as you." She puked._

_The crew immediately declined into immaturity, wolf whistling and congratulating her. Rhoda still stood there; confused and unmindful of the slaps on her back._

" _...why?" she asked, pointing at her cross-eyed self._

_Then she beamed, shoveling handfuls of petals into her mouth. "He's just being nice," she decided._

_Jared continued to send snacks in the form of roses every week. So every week, she would buy him dessert whenever she would meet with him and Lancy._

_He was nice and charming and funny. There had been some awkward moments like the time he accidentally leaned in too close and too fast. But Rhoda was able to step around just in time._

"He was trying to seduce you," Jesse flatly said.

Rhoda opened her mouth to protest. She paused. "That might make more sense. Especially what happened after."

_In the fourth time that Jared asked her to accompany him, she could tell he felt more and more frustrated._

" _Jared, are you alright?" she asked._

" _I like you."_

" _Aw, I like you too!" She froze when he took her hands._

_He looked at her with those violet eyes, contrasting with the sunset in his hair. "I like you more than that. Will you go out with me?" he bluntly asked. "For real this time?"_

"I know what flirting looks like," Rhoda explained. "But how would I know? He makes every lady feel special."

Jesse stared at her.

Ronnie stared at her.

Jacques stared at her.

The crickets stared at her as they chirped outside the window.

"But you know what I noticed back then?" She slid down on the rug to be with Jacques. Her ears drooped. "He never had a genuine connection." She gestured her hand around, trying to get the right words. "He's like a rake, he only gets to the topsoil. _"_

Jacques settled down, encircling her from behind like a black, furry backrest.

"Jared once told me Lancy saw him as her 'thing'," she looked up, absentmindedly running her fingers through his fur. "And I can tell he was right."

She glanced at her open palm. "I wanted to give him something meaningful. Nobody's ever been there for him. So I decided to give him a chance."

"And what happened?" Jesse asked.

She smiled, remembering. "We were happy. I really thought he was the one."

 _Then he relapsed,_  she thought, bitterness dredging her throat.  _He went back to his old self_.

Her ears wilted. "But I couldn't give him the love that he needed."  _Patient. Lasting._

Tears blurred her vision.  _Unconditional._

She had tried to hold on. Her friends and family only saw his flaws. But she saw what he could have been. What he had become in their first months together.

They didn't understand.

" _You're the only one who gets me, darling,"_ Jared had always said when she would get frustrated at them. " _It's you and me against the world,_ " he would say before tilting her head up for a kiss.

She rubbed her lips hard. He had given her joy. He had given her hope. But she hadn't been strong enough.

"So that's why you broke up?" Jesse asked.

Rhoda hugged her knees, shrinking back from those fifteen years.

"I just couldn't take it anymore," she whispered, her blank eyes wide.

_But… was Jared right? He was the victim right from the start._

Her heart sank lower, knowing she was now a loveless scum in Jesse's eyes. Tentatively, she sneaked a glance. Jesse was looking at her like he had opened a closet and a dead body fell out.

"Did he hurt you?" he asked, his eyes darkening. Chill began to creep inside the room.

She blinked in surprise. Then hastily waved her hands about.

"No! Of course not! He never hurt… me..." she hated how she sounded uncertain in the end. Rhoda cleared her throat. "He never even raised a hand on me," she said, unable to keep the defensiveness in her tone.

She could see his shoulders relaxed.

"I'm sorry to hear about you two," he murmured.

Rhoda climbed back on the sofa beside him, still astonished at his reaction.

"I'm sorry for scaring you." She sighed, leaning on his shoulder. "And I'm sorry for dumping all this on you." She looked down on the ground. "They just don't understand Jared the way that I do."

She could feel Jesse shift, leaning back into a more comfortable position. Even though she couldn't see his face, she could hear his voice rumbling quietly. "Thank you for telling me this." His hand briefly squeezed hers. "Is that why you moved here?"

Her head nodded against his shoulder.

"So that's why you got burnt," he stated.

She turned her head slightly, not missing the sadness in his voice. "Huh?"

"When I first met you, you were fire. But I never thought fire could get burnt."

She paused for a moment before playfully punching him on the shoulder.

"Aw, Jesse! That's poetic but I'm no muse," she chuckled.

He ruffled her hair. "You're getting your spark back," he said, his head tilted with a small smile.

Rhoda laughed at the affection in his voice, remembering the days of her stay.

 _I haven't been this happy for a long time,_  she thought. Something in her wanted to tell him. But a part of her held back.

Jesse spread his arms. "May I?" he asked.

Rhoda gratefully hugged him.  _You're irreplaceable._ Was she comforting him because he sounded sad? Or was he comforting her?

"You're going to be alright," he said, planting a kiss on her forehead while she was still in his arms.

Jacques trailed after them as they went upstairs with Jesse cradling Ronnie.

"Goodnight," she said, opening the door to the guest room. She let Jacques in before closing the door with a sigh.

_Ash, Mina, everyone -they don't get it. They keep seeing me as the victim._

She finally let her face droop in remorse.

_But I haven't told them everything. Even Jesse doesn't know._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is she the villain of her own story? Find out next time.


	8. Resilience Can Be Remembered

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She must’ve had a death wish to follow dangerous toons when her own tooning was out of whack.

"You know I can carry that for you," Jesse said.

He watched her wordlessly shake her head, wrestling with the giant sack of dogfood that was twice her size.

"No... worries..." she grunted through gritted teeth. "I'mma…. strong…. independent," she huffed, "...bunny!"

He chose not to comment. Before buying pet supplies for Jacques, Rhoda had insisted on disguising herself as an anthropomorphic dog. By folding her ears like one.

Her feet and tail were still a dead giveaway. But he didn't chose to comment on those either.

It was a given fact that Rhoda would act strange. But ever since she had told him about Jared, he now understood why Rhoda was acting  _stranger_.

Music caught his ear and he turned.

" _When you wish upon a star..."_

Rhoda yelped, plugging her ears. The sack of dogfood crashed on the ground, forgotten. The phonograph on the nearby antique shop continued to play.

" _Makes no difference who you are…_ "

Jesse could practically see her quake as she squeezed her eyes shut. The other toons were beginning to stop and stare. He reached for the phongraph's stylus and lifted it away from the playing record.

The song halted into a stop. Rhoda cracked one eye open, her chest heaving.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

Rhoda looked around. Painfully, she glanced at him, almost as if she didn't want to. When their eyes met, Jesse could see why.

Her whole face was still breaking into a cry. She grabbed the sack of dogfood and through sheer will alone, dragged it into a quiet, abandoned alley.

Jesse strode after her. He saw her slump against the building's wall as soon as he neared her.

"Rhoda?"

"I'm so sorry," she muttered, her hands over her eyes. Jesse crouched down in concern when he could still hear her breathing, deep and rapid. "Just..." she swallowed with difficulty, trying to curb her own hyperventilation. "... a moment," she gasped.

He took off his suit jacket and draped it over her shoulders. Emptying the pet supplies out of its bag, he gave it to Rhoda.

She immediately breathed in and out inside the paper bag. Jesse rubbed her back, patiently waiting for her own respiration to even.

He had a gut feeling it had something to do again with her breakup.

After a while, she pulled back the paper bag, her chest rising quietly this time. Still not meeting his eyes, she silently stood up and dusted herself.

"It's nothing to be ashamed of," Jesse said as Rhoda handed him back his jacket, her eyes on the ground.

Her rabbit ears feebly tried to fold itself back to its dog-eared disguise. "I'm sorry you have to see that. I... I shouldn't have reacted that way."

He frowned in confusion. It was something else that he had noticed about her when they met again after a long time. She was always apologizing.

Jesse began to place their bought pet supplies back to its paper bag. Rhoda knelt down to help him.

"It's just that… it used to be our song," she sighed, rubbing her face.

Jesse only nodded _._  It made sense. At least for him. Looking it in a rabbit-humanoid toon relationship, the song could mean that anyone can find love no matter who they were.

Yet people have different compatibilities. Which would explain why Rhoda had told him before that she couldn't give Jared the love that he needed. It simply didn't work out.

Jesse wasn't surprised. Jared and Rhoda were complete opposites. She was simple and direct. While Jared… Jesse always had the feeling Jared had something to do with the rumors surrounding him. Every time Jared would work in a gig where Jesse was working in, people would start treating him with suspicion.

He stood up and raised an amused brow when Rhoda dusted the knees of his pants. "What're you doing?"

She shrugged sheepishly. "I'm sorry you got dirty because of me."

"Like I said, I don't mind getting dirty if it's with you," he wryly replied .

Rhoda laugh-groaned, shoving him away. He let his smile widen a little bit more, remembering how she was always the one who would make him laugh.

Someone hurriedly passed by their alley, not seeing them.

"Wait, is that Edna?"

He immediately scowled upon seeing the detective's silhouette. No good could come from that woman.

Rhoda quickly walked out of the alley to take a better look. Jesse followed.

Humans rarely visit ToonTown. Despite Ms. Valiant hunched in her popped up collar, her form stuck out among the ink and paint.

He could see Rhoda about to call her. Then she froze, her ears swivelling behind them.

Jesse was too shocked to cry out when Rhoda suddenly seized him back into the alley. His back slammed against the brick wall and Rhoda leaned back beside him. She held her arm out in front of him, preventing him from taking a step forward. Oblivious to his surprise, her eyes furtively peeked behind the wall.

"Rhoda," he gasped, his heart drumming. "What-"

"Shhh!" she hushed, a finger on her lips.

A heartbeat. Then shadows loomed outside the alley. A large human woman in a pantsuit stalked past them, accompanied by a menacing bunch of toons.

"-bury her. Lock her up. I don't care. As long as she won't sing no more," the woman said.

"Got it boss."

Rhoda put a hand on her mouth, muffling her dismay. A bottle dropped out of one of the henchtoon's pockets as he took out a gun.

They waited for a few moments after they were out of sight. Jesse frowned. He may not like the nosy detective, but they needed to call the cops.

"I'm sorry. Did I hurt you?" Rhoda asked as soon as they were gone.

He shook his head, his own shock forgotten.

She scurried out of the alley and inspected the dropped bottle. "No," she muttered in disbelief. "It's even larger!"

Her eyes followed the path that Edna and the gang had headed to. "I thought we had that shut down!" she whispered worriedly.

"What?"

She kneaded her forehead worriedly. "Back in those times, Edna and I-" She shook her head fiercely. "Never mind. You need to call the police!"

"Me?" Jesse asked, getting more puzzled by the second. "What about you?"

Rhoda jerked out her thumb. A yellow cab zoomed into view, screeching into a halt beside them.

"Hiya, Rhoda! You rang?" the cab asked.

Rhoda pushed Jesse into the driver's seat. "Find the cops. Tell them there's bootlegging in the old warehouse on 21st Lump street."

"Ms. Cab here can do that," he said, getting an inkling of what Rhoda was planning to do.

She slapped the bottle on his hands before dumping the sack of dogfood in the passenger seat. "Brenda doesn't have hands. You do."

"But-"

Rhoda gave him a grin that was more like her old self. She held her head high as she pumped her fist.

"Don't worry, Jesse. Edna and I have done this a-plenty!"

Jesse could do nothing as Brenda sped off. He turned back, watching Rhoda ran to the direction where Edna and her pursuers went.

He opened his palm and looked at the label of the bottle. It was actual glass, not the toony kind. A large letter "T" decorate its paper with crossbones behind it. Below the image was an inscribed name.

"Toon tonic?" he read aloud in wonder.

**XOXOXOXOXO**

She was a goner.

Rhoda tugged the bowtie around her collar. She must've had a death wish to follow dangerous toons when her own tooning was out of whack.

She shook her head.  _Edna needs me,_  she thought.

The last time she had tried sneaking with Edna, they ended up being chased by five hundred and fifty-one goons. She couldn't tell who would strangle her first: Edna or them.

She thought for a moment before her eyes brightened with Rhoda logic.  _With my tooning gone haywire, maybe_ _ **I**_   _got the upperhand._

She pasted herself against the wall, craning her neck a little as they walk a little further.

They had stopped before the warehouse. Grinning to themselves, they quietly entered inside.

Her teeth worriedly bit her lip. Having stopped a heist in the old warehouse before, she knew another entry.

She made a left turn around the warehouse until she saw the air vent. Hopping from one stack of crates to another, she leapt for the vent and scrambled inside.

 _Edna is going to be proud of my stealth,_  she happily thought as crates tumbled and crashed.

She half-crawled and half-pulled herself inside. Being toony meant she could squeeze inside tight spaces. But with her tooning being erratic…

 _I don't need elbow room_ , she thought as she wriggled and squirmed.  _I need tushie room._

Her ears cocked at the voices outside the vent and she crept towards its grills.

"-and when I figured out who was the prime suspect, he disappeared," Edna said, surrounded by the henchtoons. "What did you do to him, DeGreasy?" she glared at the other human.

"Mah sister's a great businesswoman. If he got the short end of the stick, that's his problem."

"You just complicated things," she growled, backing away when the henchtoons inched closer, "Instead of letting the law handle him."

"Ain't that you?" the DeGreasy woman said back. "Y'shoudn't've stuck yer nose to nobody's biz."

The henchtoon with the gun raised his weapon.

In an impulse, Rhoda thumped the grills open. It fell, and so did she.

"Aaaugh!" she screamed, conveniently remembering she wasn't going to bounce off a fall.

Luckily, she landed on a stack of cardboard boxes. Everyone turned as dust exploded from the impact.

"Stop right there!" she cried, making a quick check for any injuries.

"Rhoda?" Edna asked in disbelief.

"The other DeGreasy sister was killed because of a bad deal on Toon Tonics," Rhoda said, all eyes on her. "Now that you've inherited the company, you want to have all the Toon Tonics to yourself!" she declared, pointing at the DeGreasy woman. "Because it's cheaper to turn your anthropomorph actors into humanoid toons instead of hiring actual ones."

She jabbed her finger at DeGreasy. "But Toon Tonics are illegal profiting from unused Disney magic so you're trying to cover your own tracks!"

"Someone else knows!" the shortest henchtoon snarled.

Rhoda paused. "Wait, I'm actually right?" she asked in awe.

Their boss pointed at her. "Get her! She knows too much!"

Rhoda stepped back when three of the henchtoons stalked towards her. "Actually, I didn't even go to college," she laughed sheepishly.

With a yell, the three henchtoons lunged forward.

She screamed, fur fluffing like an overgrown cat. Rhoda ran.

DeGreasy and her other henchtoon turned back to Edna. Only to find her gone.

"Gawdamnit, where did she go?" she growled before a pair of feet acrobatically swung towards her back.

**XOXOXOXOXO**

DeGreasy and her gang misdirected, Rhoda now faced the trouble of shaking off her tail.

_Jeepers, I do NOT have the upperhand!_

She glanced behind her. One was a toony humanoid with a gun. The other was a burly anthropomorphic bull. The last one was the shortest one.

"Eat slugs, rabbit!" the henchtoon said, pointing the gun at her.

BANG!

Rhoda ducked. Then she jolted, still running. Something wet, cold and slimy slid down her back. She made a grab at it.

"Eew," she grimaced at the slug on her hand. "No offense," she hurriedly said at the slug's despondent look.

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

The toon with the gun laughed in frenzy. Rhoda cringed, feeling slugs and slime all over herself.

Her ears perked against the goo at seeing a door ahead with an open mail slot. Until she remembered she couldn't toon enough to fit through it.

She sharply made a U-turn. The henchtoons stopped in surprise. Using the slug slime running down her legs, she slid between the gunman's legs and past them.

There was a thud when the toon bent over and accidentally slipped head over heels. His landed on his head and the other two henchtoons continued the chase.

"Come back here!" the shortest henchtoon said, skidding and sliding after her.

In an effort to lose them, she went into the maze of crates and shelves, letting her feet take her to where they may.

Left. Right. Another right. Center. Go into the restroom. Free the slugs into the sink. Get out of the restroom. Left. Ri- center. Under the table. Over the shelf.

Was she still leaving a trail of slime?

She didn't know where she was running. All she wanted was a way to get away.

"Check out these guns, baby!" the burly bull grinned, abruptly appearing right in front of her.

She screamed in surprise as he raised a fist.

"Gotcha!" the short henchtoon said, hugging her tight from behind with her arms locked on her sides.

Still slimey from the slugs, she slipped out from under the small henchtoon's grasp.

Wooden crate shards flew everywhere as the bull's fist rammed right into the other henchtoon.

Cornered, she stepped back when the bull rounded on her, smirking. Flexing his arms, he kissed the air with a wink.

Rhoda wrinkled her nose, caught the flying kiss and threw it on the ground. She stamped on it before putting her hands on her hips.

"Does your mother know you act that way?" she sternly asked.

The bull swung his fist again. "Nope!"

Rhoda yelled, ducking from the force of broken shelves. Something slippery and squishy crawled down her palm. She glanced down to see a slug in her grasp.

"Time to say goodnight, baby!" the bull said, throwing another hit.

Without thinking, Rhoda threw the slug to his face.

Without thinking either, the bull punched where the slug had landed.

She flinched at the colliding "POW!" of his knuckles.

A beat after the aftershock, she furtively glanced at him.

He groaned, twirling in ballet. Stars and swirls orbited his head.

"'Kay, goodnight," he mumbled before crashing on the ground.

"No!" Rhoda cried, rushing to his side. She knelt down on the unconscious bull, scooping the slug off his face. "Are you alright?" she asked the slug.

The slug's stalks merrily waved. She recognized it as the first slug that was shot at her.

"I'm so sorry," she whispered, hugging the slug close to her. "I thought I got every slug into the sink."

She stood up and walked away from the rubble. The slug shook its head.

"You stayed back to help me?"

The slug nodded on her palm.

"Thank you!" she gratefully smiled. For a moment, she wondered if the Disney Princes were rubbing off on her. Nevertheless, she went back to the restroom to finally get the slug its hard-earned water.

**XOXOXOXOXO**

Meanwhile, Edna finished tying up Ms. DeGreasy and her henchtoon with a toon-proof rope.

"The police are gonna pick up the garbage soon," she promised.

She ran to where Rhoda and the others went off too.  _It's been a while since we've done this again._

Fifteen years ago, she had sworn off from helping toons ever again. Even after she found closure on who was the killer of her sister and detective partner, Thelma.

After all, it didn't change the fact that toons were dangerous and couldn't be trusted.

Till a rabbit came bursting into her office, begging for her help for Maroon Studios. The silly hare was under the illusion that Edna was back in business with helping toons.

Rhoda stuck on her like a stray cat that sneakily became part of the household. Before she knew it, Edna was back again to helping them.

" _Everyone knows that when a toon's in trouble, there's only one place to go -Valiant!"_ Rhoda would proudly say. Then she would perk into that earnest grin that unwittingly spoke of endearing side characters that die in the movies. " _Besides, I want to make people smile._ "

Edna shook her head, turning her head away even if no one could see the upturn of her mouth.

Habits are hard to break. Because even when Rhoda stopped coming with her, Edna still found herself solving cases involving toons.

Rhoda said her boyfriend wanted her safe and sound, which was why she had to stop.

Edna's lips pressed into a hard line. That would've been more believable if Rhoda didn't sound like a dried, hollow bone. Yet it was all for the best. Thelma would always be her partner and Rhoda was a tag-along. In a helpfully disastrous way.

She skidded and almost fell from a trail of slime. An unconscious henchtoon was draped in the most uncomfortable position.

Edna kicked away his slippery gun.

"Toons," she muttered.

**XOXOXOXOXO**

Police sirens could be heard as Rhoda went out of the ladies' restroom. She breathed a sigh of relief, her head thumping against a shelf.

Above her, a bottle toppled. She looked up wondering what it was.

The bottle fell, it's opening plunging straight into Rhoda's slack mouth. Her eyes widened at the invasion of its contents. The oily taste of sweat of slaving artists ran down her throat like salt and nails.

Yet in her shock, her throat gulped reflexively.

**XOXOXOXOXO**

Brenda screeched into a halt before the warehouse, the police cars behind them. Jesse climbed out, worrying where Rhoda might be.

Everyone shielded their eyes when a brilliant light flashed through every crevice of the warehouse.

There was silence as they all blinked back into their senses.

"Someone drank Toon Tonic!" one of the police toons yelled.

He didn't know what the police was talking about. He didn't care.

Not when he could hear a long, horrified scream that frightened him worse than he could ever imagine.

"Rhoda!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry guys, but this will be the only chapter for this week. Good news though, I got into a great job :D
> 
> I remember some people asking for a "Going Human" version for Rhoda Rabbit. Welp, this is as close as it could get.


	9. Solace Can Be Sought

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She should've felt disgusted back then, knowing her boyfriend was flirting with a stranger. Instead, she had only felt joy. 
> 
> It was like the sweeter times back then, when there was no confusion. No guilt. Back when she was still sure he liked her as a person.

Jesse impatiently waited behind the police lines.

"Loosen up, pal. Rhoda will be fine," Brenda the cab assured him. "She used ta crack cases with that gumshoe."

Anthropomorphic police bulldogs hurried in and out of the warehouse. He could hear snatches of their conversation. Ms. Valiant had once again cracked another case. Ms. Valiant took down the criminals by herself. Ms. Valiant found a humanoid toon girl inside the warehouse.

He sighed. Snatches of information that he cared not a whit. He could at least breathe that there was no sign of a hostage situation. Or any kind of an emergency.

But still, there was no word about Rhoda.

He stopped a toon police dog in his tracks. The bulldog growled. Jesse ignored it.

"Have you seen her?"

The bulldog shook his head. "No sign of a rabbit, Mister."

He let out a sigh, turning back to the old warehouse. His eyes caught sight of a vaguely familiar form. Ms. Valiant was missing her trench coat. The scowling middle-aged woman tugged her suspenders, the knees of her trousers scuffed. She pinched the bridge of her nose as she led a glum humanoid toon girl out, her trench coat draped on the toon's shoulders.

Jesse frowned. If Rhoda did help Valiant with sleuthing, how come Valiant was leaving without her?

The humanoid toon girl froze at the sight of him. He ignored it, focusing his attention to the entrance of the warehouse.

He should've stopped her from going on her own. But when she smiled and told him that she was going to be fine, he believed her.

Jesse resisted the urge to pace, remaining a cool exterior instead. Brenda only grinned when he heavily exhaled.

He shouldn't have let sentimentality get to him, seeing how she smiled like her old self. A smile that was less scared. Less sorry. Less sa-

Much to his consternation, Valiant stalked towards him.

"You," Valiant said.

"Where's Rhoda?"

Valiant jerked her thumb behind her. The humanoid toon girl over her shoulder ducked, covering her face.

"Jeepers, Edna! Not like that!"

Jesse's eyes widened. She… sounded familiar.

Valiant sighed and rolled her eyes heavenward.

"Toon Tonic is warehouse Disney magic -pixie dust, wand dust, whatever. Schmucks smuggle it ta suckers who want humanoid privilege," she let out in one exhale. "Which Rhoda here, accidentally drank."

The humanoid toon girl's pigtails joined her hands into covering her face. Jesse walked past Edna and reached for her.

"...Rhoda?"

He tipped up her chin and she reluctantly looked into his eyes. He startled, knowing that open, blue gaze anywhere.

"Rhoda," he simply said. Underneath the trench coat draped on her shoulders, Jesse could see Rhoda's signature clothes.

She looked like a young woman who was about to teach the fun way to learn ABCs. Underneath her overalls dress, a polka dot bow was tied around the peter pan collar of her white blouse with puffed sleeves. Instead of rabbit ears, ginger pigtails swayed on either side of her head. Her yellow-gloved hands fidgeted nervously. She ducked deeper into Valiant's trenchcoat, giving him an apologetic bucktooth smile.

"H'llo Jesse," she muttered, looking like she'd rather disappear.

Edna impatiently kneaded her forehead. "Do me a favor and get her home, willya? The suspect says the magic only lasts about four hours."

The human police force were starting to arrive and Edna retrieved her trenchcoat from Rhoda.

"Go, before she gets caught up to all this hullabaloo," Edna said as journalists began to snap pictures.

Jesse led Rhoda to Brenda, still surprised at the turn of events.  _She looked..._

"Geez, Rhoda. You look like yer gonna play Candyland with the kids or sumthin'," Brenda commented.

He glanced at her. Her face looked more like she was going to attend a funeral instead.

"Take us home, Brenda," Rhoda softly spoke, wrapping herself with her arms. "P-p-p-please."

**XOXOXOXOXO**

Just when she thought Jesse had seen the worst of her, life had a way of proving her wrong.

At least now that she was bigger, she have less trouble carrying the sack of dogfood.

"Thanks, Brenda," she called back, trying to push her face into a semblance of a smile. Just big enough to show her that she was all better now.

Brenda beeped, speeding off for another passenger. Jacques barked, bounding towards them. He paused when he saw Rhoda.

Jesse immediately went between them. "Easy."

But Rhoda went past him and crouched down, stretching her hands for Jacques to smell.

"It's me, Jacques."

Jesse still snapped the bought collar around Jacques before letting him get near her. The massive dog sniffed her fingers uncertainly. He whined, barking, as though to ask, "What happened to you now?" Yet he lined his flank to her, allowing her scratch to his back.

Relieved, Jesse passed them by to unlock the door. They entered the house and she made a beeline for the stairs.

"I'm gonna stay in bed," she called out to Jesse. She gestured at her humanoid form. "Till this wears off."

She hopped for the guest room. Then tripped on her too-long human legs.

"Are you okay?" Jesse asked from downstairs after a thud that could be heard in the entire house.

"I'm fine!" she yelled back. Rubbing a bump on her forehead, she opened the door with a sigh. She was still as accident prone as ever. Maybe she could get unconscious before her thoughts would become too much.

Rhoda finally allowed herself to limp, a casualty from falling off the air vent. Worsened by all the running. Too bad Disneyfication didn't fix her whacked tooning.

It took her awhile to take off her Mary Jane shoes, unused to having footwear. At least Disney magic got rid of the slug slime off her.

She flopped on the bed like a ragdoll. Her body hurt. After the rush of the events, it seemed like every part of her body had lined up for a complaint.

 _Jeepers, do I get this roughed up whenever I help Edna solve cases?_  she pondered.  _I'd sell my rabbit's foot if I could just shake it off right now. Oh, wait..._

She closed her eyes with a sigh.  _I'll just have to nap it off._

She didn't know how long had she had lain in there. Time ticked on. Her hands clenched the sheets, itching to knock herself out with a mallet. Unfortunately, her hammerspace was gone due to her Disneyfication.

She rolled to her back, exhaling. Her hands pulled the ribbons holding her pigtails, if only to loosen the ache in her head. She shuddered at the feeling of her hair cascading down her shoulders. It felt weird, having a long patch of fur that only covers her head. She rubbed the back of her neck to ease some tension, creeped out by the feel of smooth skin.

Rhoda turned away a desk mirror, unable to look at herself.

She never liked being a humanoid toon. In fact, she couldn't understand why some anthropomrphs would give their hind leg to be humanoid.

It wasn't just because she was clumsier with her longer limbs. Or that it was harder to shake off injuries. Or that she have extra fingers.

It was because she got caught.

 _How long should four hours last?_  she wondered, kneading her pounding head. She smacked her lips. The inside of her mouth felt like sandpaper. The urge to drink coffee crawled with anticipation at the back of her throat.

Coffee was her friend. Coffee wouldn't let her think. Coffee would just let her work on her cottage like a pinball of energy. Coffee would never let her dwell what her human form had costed her. Had costed  _them._

The ticking of the clock got louder.

 _Coffee_ , her mind urged.

She shut her eyes tight, the ghosts of her past cranking the worn gears of her thoughts.

Years ago, she and Edna had discovered Toon Tonic by accident. Unable to bear the rumors that Toon Tattler was spreading about Jared, she hired Edna. Then she tagged along to put a stop on it.

 _Coffee!_  her mind panicked, realizing where her thoughts were going.

Only for Edna to discover that the journalist's references were strong. Heavier than a telephone book and twice as thick.

Her mind frantically bang around her skull.  _Coffee! Coffee! Coffee!_

Rhoda swallowed, curling into a ball.

So they staked out the place where Jared was going to stay after filming  _Gone with the Wind._  Rhoda was hellbent to straighten out the journalist and tell them to leave Jared alone.

On that fateful day, they accidentally interrupted some smuggled goods.

_Coffecoffeecoffecoffee-_

Rhoda clamped down her ears.

In a whirl of fisticuffs, a bottle got shoved into her lips. By the time Edna had knocked everyone down, Rhoda was missing her fur and several indicators of being a rabbit.

Rhoda may not have taken it well. Edna had to remind her that they need to get out as soon as possible -with a slap back to her senses. So they did, trying to blend in with the hotel's dining crowd.

Then she bumped into Jared.

_COFFEECOFFEECOFFFEECOFFFEE-_

She curled tighter, torn between unwanted urges and unwanted memories.

" _Excuse me, miss. Can you point me to the hotel's dessert area?" Jared asked._

_She shook her head, too scared to even speak._

_He tipped up her chin with a mischievous smirk. "Because I want a cutie pie like you."_

Rhoda yelped when she sharply turned away from the past so hard, she smacked an imprint on the carpet.

Her hand gingerly touched new goose egg on her head as she winced.

She should've felt disgusted back then, knowing her boyfriend was flirting with a stranger.

But instead, she had only felt joy. It was like the sweeter times back then, when there was no confusion. No guilt. Back when she was still sure he liked her as a person.

She withered along with her thoughts. Along with her concussions, the ache in her head began to pulse with the craving. The inside of her mouth tingled in anticipation.

_COFFEE. COFFEE. COFFEE-_

She curled into a tight ball on the uncomfortable floor. Maybe she should've taken Jacques with her. But she didn't deserve the comfort. She never did. This was her punishment for taking things that made her happy. Like adopting Jacques.

Her heart broke, remembering the reassuring kiss on the forehead Jesse had once given her.

 _You're so pathetic,_  Jared jeered in her head.

Rhoda dryly swallowed. She began to pant, whether from the coffee cacoethes or from a ghost of Jared confronting her, she didn't know.

There was a knock so soft, she almost missed it.

Her body stilled, not daring to make a sound. Not when she'd rather imitate a tight wad of tissue.

She didn't know why she stood up with her ungainly humanoid legs. Maybe because it couldn't get any worse.

Her hands smoothed down the flare of her overalls dress. Putting on a small smile just to show that she was fine, she opened the door.

Jesse stood on the doorway with a steaming mug of jasmine tea.

"Hi," he said. "Are you alright?"

Rhoda wanted nothing more than to jump out of the window and run.

"I'm fine," she said in what she hoped didn't sound like forced chirpiness.

It felt weird being in the eye level of Jesse's neck, instead of his legs. She looked down on her human hands with too many fingers. Then she glanced at the clock. "Just three hours and thirty more minutes," she sighed.

"Do you want some?" he asked, giving her the mug.

She smiled, feeling the painful twinge in her chest. What kind of a person was she to move on from a relationship too fast?

Rhoda let him in and took it. "Thank you," she closed her eyes, inhaling a trickle of orange in its scent. "I've always like it with a tang."'

"I know," was his casual reply. "You mentioned it once.

Her eyes widened in surprise. She hoped Jesse mistook the redness of her face from the vapors of the tea. "Really?" She busied herself to sitting cross-legged on the bed. After a moment's hesitation, she patted the spot beside it.

"One time during breakfast," he replied, sitting down with her, his feet on the floor.

She took a sip, drowning her senses away from coffee.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

She opened her eyes again that she didn't remember closing. Jesse was looking at her quietly.

"I know I said that if you won't tell, I won't ask." He paused. "But in case you want to talk about it, I'm here."

Rhoda choked in her steaming mug. Maybe he was right to reject her from the start, falling in love for him because of how he treated everyone.

Jesse patted her back as she hacked, her burnt tongue sticking out. Way to be classy.

With a final cough, she leaned back on the headboard, sighing. "I just… I just have some bad memories about this form," she replied, gesturing at her peach-toned knees and socked feet.

Jesse had already seen her had a meltdown once. Then as a rabbit that couldn't keep a relationship. Lastly, a cherry on top: having a panic attack in public because of a song. She might as well take off her sheep's clothing and ruin her second chance with Jesse.

 _There was NEVER a second chance!_  She mentally yelled at herself.

Her eyes closed, feeling the tea's steam softly hit the bare skin of her face. In a moment of calm, she said it.

"Jared caught me investigating him with Edna," she spoke, her voice devoid of her shame. Or anything at all.

_The Toon tonic smugglers were caught and Edna had saved the day again. The crowd applauded and Rhoda cheered with them on Edna's side._

_But the small bottle of Toon Tonic only lasted an hour and in a blast of light, Rhoda transformed back into a rabbit._

_The people around her mirrored her shock. Then she caught Jared's eye._

Rhoda turned her head away. Warmth seeped to her fingers from the mug. But she only felt cold.

"I broke his trust." Her memories echoed in her mind.

_Jared turned his back and left._

" _Jared, wait!" she cried, reaching out for him._

_He didn't wait._

_Edna snorted. "Why's he the one steaming mad?"_

" _You don't understand, Jared doesn't know that I go to your office after work." She winced, covering her mouth. "Jared wanted me to be straight home."_

_Edna's nose wrinkled, her mouth agape in puzzlement._

" _It's how he cares." Her ears drooped. "And now I've ruined it."_

"I've always been a fan of Edna and Thelma Valiant," she confessed to Jesse. "So when I became Edna's friend, I was happy enough to tag along with her."

"But," her pigtails drooped. "I never told Jared."

When Jared had wanted her home after work, she didn't mind. Yes, it sacrificed spending time with her friends. But it made her happy because it showed her that Jared cared. In her mind's eyes, she could see what happened next.

_As soon as Jared came home, Rhoda leapt to him for a hug._

_"Jared!"_

_He caught her midway with an impatient sound. Her breath hitched when he dropped her unceremoniously on the floor. Rhoda pressed her lips against the tightening of her throat. Jared never liked it when she would cry._

_"I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to investigate you, I was trying to stop the paparazzi from gossiping 'bout you. I swear!_ _And..." She stopped. Then her shoulders drooped in defeat. "I know I should've been home back then. But I enjoy solving cases with Edna," she said, unable to keep the plea in her voice. "It gives me something to do when I'm not acting."_

_She held his hands, his eyes still refusing to look at her._

_"I really want to hang out with her. I'm sorry I didn't tell you before."_

_"So I'm the bad guy here?"_

_"What? No, I-"_

_"This is why you should be at home after work, Rhoda." He sighed, massaging his temple. "Instead of doing something crazy_ again _, you could've just asked me about whatever those tabloids been messing with your head."_

_"I've been asking you!" she said in exasperation. Something in her panicked, admonishing her for breaking an unspoken rule._

_His tone went cold. "Have you, really?"_

_"Yeah." Her mind scrambled to remember when. "Like that time I..."_

_His eyebrow raised when she couldn't say a specific date._

_"I'm sorry," she mumbled, looking down._

_"'Cause from what I remember, you're always accusing me."_

_She looked up, stunned. "What? No, I don't-"_

_He let out a laugh. "And I'm the bad guy?"_

_"Where have you been, Jared?" he asked in a high-pitched, sticky voice. "Why're you late, Jared? Jared, this tabloid this, this tabloid that." He spoke back in his normal tone, folding his arms. "You're obsessed and being with that detective is making it worse."_

_She stepped back a little, still shocked at the revelations. "I'm not..." But what if she was?_

_"Stay. Home."_

_Her whiskers drooped. "Okay," she answered, her voice small._

_He sighed, turning away. "You're lucky on how much I put up with this relationship."_

She rubbed her eyes. "I'm so sorry," she told Jesse, chastising herself for tearing out of the blue. Remembering their conversation now, Jared didn't do anything wrong.

_So why am I crying?_

Maybe Jared was right, he was the only one who could handle her and her mood swings.

She sneaked a glance and true to her prediction, Jesse looked surprised.

Her eyes were still leaking like a broken faucet and she hurriedly wiped them.  _Jeepers, why now?_

Rhoda startled when she felt his hand patting her far shoulder.

She laughed, leaning forward to free his arm.

"Jeepers, why didn't you tell me," she chuckled over her embarrassment. Back when he had patted her back after she choked on her tea, she didn't realize that she had trapped his arm when she leaned against the headboard.

He gave her a hankie and she gratefully blew her nose.

"I'm sorry, I don't know what got into me," she said, her words muffled by the handkerchief.

"Sometimes, a faucet has to let all the rusty water out before it can be clean again," Jesse replied.

Rhoda laughed before honking in the hankie.

"That sounds like something I would say," she chided.

"It is," he agreed.

She felt his arm squeeze her shoulders and slightly pull her close, his face questioning.

In reply, she leaned to his side, her eyes feeling heavy. Perhaps crying in front of Jesse had some upsides. She grimaced, wondering if she could shake off the consequences of post-cry-in-your-sleep exhaustion that would wreak havoc with her peepers tomorrow.

"I'm sorry, you have to see me this way," she mumbled.

"Don't be. It takes some time to detach and see things as they are."

She sighed, closing her eyes. "I wish I was more like you, Jesse. Nothing seems to faze ya," she yawned. She felt herself relaxed against his side, enjoying his warmth.

Jesse said nothing. Time passed and her head began to nod off to sleep. She felt him lean back comfortably against the headboard, his long legs stretched out on the bed.

"I wished I hadn't been so detached," he finally said. "It made me wonder what would've been if..." He turned to look at her, her head resting on his shoulder.

Only to see her fast asleep.

He chuckled, deciding it would be best not to wake her up. The clock by her bedside showed that her form still had three hours to go.

For a moment, he wondered if he was  _really_ doing the right thing.

Rhoda had always inspired craziness in her surroundings. But the rush of events that had happened had left him exhausted from worry. He finally allowed himself to relax, closing his eyes.

"But I can wait a little more."

He fell asleep, his arm securing around her a little closer.

Unnoticed by either of them, Rhoda began to glow. Light flashed and sparks exploded everywhere. Beside Jesse, a rabbit now slept where the humanoid toon girl had been.

**XOXOXOXOX**

Ignoring the patrons drinking in the bar, Edna nursed her egg cream instead.

"I'm sorry that Rhoda had been a casualty," Doris said behind the bar. "Were they able to fix it?"

"It wears off." She fiddled with her straw. "I just don't get why she acts like it's some kind of a curse."

He flicked chocolate sprinkles into her egg cream. "Well, if Disney movies taught me anything, there is a way to break a curse."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The answer to the ending could be found in Frozen. Have you watched the sequel trailer? Looks promising.
> 
> What I loved about this fic is that I have more focus on writing about Jesse and Rhoda's friendship. Unfortunately, Jesse only got a biased view of Rhoda against herself in this chapter.
> 
> And that's the chapter for today. Sorry it took a while. My sleeping sched had been out of whack for the last few weeks but I'm now getting used to my new sleep sched. I was going to let this chapter marinate some more, but I'm gonna be busy in the weekends. So I have to post it today.
> 
> Notice how Rhoda didn't confront Jared with flirting with a supposed stranger? Through Fear, Obligation and Guilt (FOG), Rhoda was conditioned to constantly explain herself to Jared. She never noticed his Reverse-Victim-ing.


	10. Felicity can be Found

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rhoda Rabbit's sort-of niece and nephew from the Fleischer studios came to visit: Bertie Boop and Poppy the Sailorwoman's kid and Koko the Clown's kid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The two new characters in this chapter belongs to Donutsforlife of Deviantart. She edited parts of this chapter and the next. Checkout her gallery, guys: https://www.deviantart.com/donutsarelife/art/Lil-Penny-and-Coco-the-Fleischer-Kids-776778685

"Are you sure you're alright?"

Rhoda stretched, taking in the sunlight streaming down the window. "I'm fine, Jesse. You got nothin' to worry about."

She could feel Jesse frown behind her. Turning around, she flashed him a sheepish smile.

It had been a week since the event with Edna. When she had woken up as a rabbit again, Rhoda felt relief. When she saw that she was sleeping next to Jesse, Rhoda only knew horror.

" _Aaaugh!"_

_There was a shuddering thud when she fell off the bed._

" _Ow, jeepers!" she muttered straightening up. Only to stumble again at the protest of her right foot. Instinctively, she tried to shake off the persistent twinge._

" _OW!"_

" _Rhoda?"_

_She froze._

_Jesse was rubbing his eyes. His brows furrowed. "What's wrong with your foot?" he asked, getting up from the bed._

That was when Rhoda had to explain that her tooning had been unpredictable for months. She couldn't put a finger in his expression after. But he might've been remembering the time she fell through a roof. Or helped stop a crime. Or had been caught in the middle of a storm.

When she had mentioned working on her cottage again, Jesse reasoned with her. By putting his hands on her shoulders and looking at her with an intensity of a crescendo.

Needless to say, she opted to rest for a week until her foot got better. At least, Ronnie got more playtime after.

Rhoda snapped out of her thoughts, showing her foot to him.

"I'm fine now, see?" she said, rotating her ankle.

Jesse knelt down in one knee and caught her foot. In her surprise, she clutched his shoulders for support.

He moved her ankle, watching her face. "Does it hurt?"

It took every ounce of her acting skills to maintain a placid face. Yet she could feel her ears burn.

She startled upon hearing a familiar voice sing outside.

" _Is you is or is you ain't my baby._ "

She hopped out of Jesse's hold and looked out of the window. Curious, Jesse peeked out too.

A black-and-white toon little girl skipped down the sidewalk. She was carrying a stack of wooden boards over her shoulder.

" _Maybe baby's found somebody new_ ," she warbled.

A monocrhome clown boy "carried" the other end of the stack. Or at least he made an effort. The little girl was so strong, the clown boy's feet was dangling in the air.

Rhoda beamed. Then just as it had appeared, her smile slid vanished as she slumped below the window frame.

"You know those two?" Jesse asked.

Her hands fretted with her ears. "They're kind of like my niece and nephew. They're the Fleischer kids."

"Bertie has a kid?" he asked. He remembered Bertie Boop working in the "Paint-and-Ink" club before. But then Bertie retired. The last thing Jesse heard about him was that he became a teacher for tooning.

"The little girl is his and Poppy's. You know, Poppy the sailorwoman?"

Jesse nodded in understanding. That would explain the little girl's tremendous strength.

She peeked in the window beside him. The little girl and boy had stopped by her cottage.

"Aww… they're here to visit me!" she smiled. Then she stopped. "Nooo..." she groaned, sliding back into hiding.

He touched her shoulder. "Aren't you happy to see them?"

"I am!" she exclaimed, surprised by the question. Her ears wilted. "I'm just not exactly the perfect model for good life decisions!" she exclaimed, gesturing at herself. "What if I contaminate them? Jeepers, I should wear gloves!"

"You  _are_ wearing gloves."

They could hear the little girl call out.

"Aunt Rhooooodddaaaaa!"

Rhoda practically jumped out of her fur. She sighed, getting up. "I should've known they'd find me. They're very smart for their age."

Jesse couldn't help but hear the pride in her voice.

With a deep breath, she put on a smile before opening the door.

**XOXOXOXO**

"I bet Aunt Rhoda's gonna pop her top when she sees us!" Penny Boop said, who wanted to believe in the best in people.

"Yeah, sure she will," Coco the Pierrot replied, who knew better.

At the young age of eleven, Coco had stopped believing that grownups knew what they were doing. Aunt Rhoda going steady with that creep was one example.

He and Penny had met him once when he was eight and Penny was nine. It was on the drawnday of his mother, Koko the Clown. Coco hated him already. What's-his-name barely interacted with his and Penny's parents.

So when news spread that their Aunt Rhoda was unhitched, Penny wanted to visit her. Coco wanted to wait. So they had a compromise and went to visit Aunt Rhoda.

Coco rolled his eyes. He and Penny were cousins by the same inkwell, their parents being the major stars of Fleischer studios. Penny meant well. But it wasn't like they could console Aunt Rhoda. He didn't even know how to comfort a grown rabbit.

"Aunt Rhoooddaaa!" Penny called out again.

Coco dropped down from the wood boards that he had been hanging on and glanced at the cottage. Their parents knew the folks who were the middlemen of Acme delivery. When he and Penny found out that one of their clients were Rhoda Rabbit, they took their chance.

"Is this really the place?" Coco wondered, glancing at the cottage in front of them. The house was small and rundown. With a giant hole on the roof like something fell through it.

Penny checked the receipt in her hand. "As eggs in coffee, junyah."

"What're we even gonna say? "Sorry for your loss?" Cos' I ain't sorry at all."

The door next to the cottage opened.

"Kids?"

Penny screeched in glee upon seeing Aunt Rhoda, throwing up the wooden boards. Coco caught them, collapsing under the weight.

"Aunt Rhoda! Good ta see ya, I missed ya so much!" she screamed, tackling her into a hug.

Coco struggled with one end of the boards, cursing. He dragged the wooden boards toward them.

"Not so hard, dearie," Aunt Rhoda laughed.

"WOOF!"

Coco screamed when a giant black dog came gallumphing towards him. His knees buckled under the weight of his paws on his shoulders.

"Ah think he's taken a slight shine on ya, junyah," Penny giggled as the dog slobbered all over him.

"Geroff me!" he yelled in his deep voice, summoning a ghost out of the ground.

The dog nipped after the floating spirit as it groaned away.

"You have a pretty kitty," Penny said conversationally, her arms cuddling a fluffy white feline.

"She's not actually mine," Rhoda chuckled, scratching the cat behind the ears.

"Then who-"

Sensual jazz music filled the air. A humanoid toon of elegant lines and smooth red hair came outside the house that their aunt had been from.

"Hello," he said in a deep, velvety rumble that Coco had often heard from his favorite records.

Penny put her hands on her cheeks with a long, happy shriek reserved for seeing Hollywood stars. Coco's hands slacked and the wooden beams crunched down on his foot.

Jacques barked, running around Coco as he howled, clutching his toes.

"Right. Jesse, meet Penny and Coco," Rhoda introduced. "Coco's one of your biggest fans."

Coco's pierrot hat deflated over his face in embarrassment.  _First impressions, Coco._

He lifted his hat away to see Penny looking at Aunt Rhoda. Then to  _the_  Jesse Krupnick (just one of the greatest vocalists who ever improved the classics with a touch of his soulful melody). Then to the house where they both came out of.

Her eyes sparkled with the intensity of a thousand stars.

"I am  _SO_ happy for you, Aunt Rhoda!" she squealed, clutching their aunt's arm.

Coco hid under his hat.  _So much for second impressions._

**XOXOXOXO**

He and Penny sat in the living room. Jesse Krupnick's living room. Mr. Krupnick and their Aunt Rhoda were both in the kitchen, preparing snacks. Coco took the opportunity to turn to Penny who was still doing a prolonged happy squee.

"Listen, Penny. Do not embarrass us. I repeat. Do NOT embarrass us," he whispered. Knowing Penny, she could be as much of a romantic sap as uncle Bertie.

Penny simply looked at the kitchen with dreamy eyes.

"Don'cha think autumn weddings are lovely, junyah?" she sighed.

Coco slapped a hand over his eyes.

In the kitchen, Aunt Rhoda was on the tip of her toes on the counter. She was trying to reach for a tin of biscuits on a high shelf. Instead of getting it for her, Jesse Krupnick came by and lifted her up by the waist. Her hands grabbed the tin and he set her down on the counter again.

Coco practically fell to the side when Penny happily melted on top of him.

"Ain't they just perfect? Don't cha think, junyah?" she asked, monochrome hearts popping all over the room.

He firmly set her to sit up straight. "Aunt Rhoda said they're just housemates," he grounded.

Her eyes twinkled with that mischievous glee that had led him flat on his face too many times.

"Penny, no."

"Penny, yes."

She put on an innocent smile when the grownups came back.

"I'm so glad to see you two, you've grown!" Rhoda said, setting down two glasses of milk.

"Yeah, and I can't believe Mr. Krupnick's your neighbor!" Penny said with a winning grin to Mr. Krupnick's direction.

"Please, call me Jesse."

Penny turned to Coco. "Y'hear that, junyah?" she teased with a wink.

Coco knew exactly what Penny was trying to do. His thoughts were getting too jumbled up from the idea of being first-name basis with his idol to stop her.

"Aunt Rhoda always bought your records for his birthday," Penny continued. "They enjoy listening to your covers."

He was dimly reminded of a master chess player moving the pieces across the chess board.

It was true Aunt Rhoda would listen with him as she would tell him stories of Jesse Krupnick. Once, out of Penny's earshot, he had asked Aunt Rhoda how to act more social. She only glanced at the record player where Mr. Krupnik's song could be heard. With a fond smile, she said that he reminded her of someone. Mr. Krupnick wasn't also the most outgoing person and that was fine.

 _Just be kind, that's it,_  she had told him.

"Funny, I always watch your Aunt Rhoda's shorts when it's in theaters."

Penny's eyes glimmered a thousandfold. "You do?!"

"You do?" Aunt Rhoda asked, stunned. Much to Coco's surprise, a blush spread under her whiskers.

"Just a friend supporting another friend," Jesse replied with a warm smile to their aunt.

Coco clamped his ears when Penny shrilled in happiness while shaking him. He wasn't worried about Aunt Rhoda's reaction. She was almost the same when it comes to random loudness. At least, Mr. Krupnick looked like he was used to the same levels of exuberant energy.

Penny happily leaned on the table. "Tell us! What's your favorite short? What was Aunt Rhoda like when you two were working together? If you have a kid, what will you name them?"

Coco shrinked several inches in embarrassment.

"Uh… Veronica if they're a girl and Mozart if they're a boy?" Jesse supplied.

"Mozart?" Rhoda echoed. "I like the name Jack. Rose is good too."

"Rose," he tested in his tongue before nodding. "I like that."

Penny clutched her cheeks in delight, probably imagining what Aunt Rhoda and Mr. Krupnick's kids would look like. A girl, perhaps, as elegant as Mr. Krupnick and as cute as Aunt Rhoda.

Coco could only imagine a kid that was supposed to be as classically suave as Mr. Krupnick, only to have Aunt Rhoda's same goofy expression.

His brain immediately rejected the image.

Coco slapped a hand over his eyes as Penny continued to interview him. They weren't even this stringent when Aunt Rhoda was with that nogoodnik plugged nickel.

Aunt Rhoda chuckled beside him. "Don't worry, Coco. It's fine."

"-Aunt Rhoda got whacked so hard, she couldn't shake it off for a while," Penny gushed. "Then she saw you on TV and tried to hug the screen-"

"Okay!" Aunt Rhoda exclaimed. "Who wants to take the pets out for a walk?"

**XOXOXOXO**

They returned shortly. It turned out Jacques wasn't used to being on a leash and Ronnie was too used to being on a leash. While they were choosing a spot to rest, no one had noticed that Ronnie had walked in circles, creating loops around their feet. Penny accidentally let his toy ball loose and Jacques tried to chase after it. The ball rolled around them and in the chaos, both leashes coiled tight around Rhoda and Jesse's legs. Because Rhoda was just 3-4 heads tall, she grabbed him by the hips to keep them from slamming together. It was a good thing the kids were too preoccupied with retrieving the ball.

Jesse actually found the whole thing amusing. Rhoda's face looked like it was now the permanent shade of red.

"Jacques," she said a little too firmly when they were back in his lawn, "will need some practice being in a leash." She whipped out a brush, a determined gleam in his eye. "For now, he needs some brushin'."

As she wrestled her dog to the ground, Jesse took off the leash from Ronnie's.

"I'll go get some lemonade," he said, entering the house.

In the kitchen, he could hear Rhoda outside physically negotiating with Jacques. He could also hear the door creaked before hushed whispers ensued. Jesse took his time taking out the pitcher and glasses.

When he turned around, Coco and Penny were in the kitchen.

"Thank you for taking care of our auntie," Penny said.

Jesse smiled. Rhoda was right. They were sweet kids.

"We're really glad it's over with that guy," Coco continued.

"Is she really boop-oop-a-doop?" she asked, her eyes shimmering.

Jesse internally nodded in understanding. The solemnity in Coco's eyes demanded to be levelled with. Penny's face was coaxing for an honest talk.

"She is." He knelt down to their eye level. "Penny, I know you just want your aunt to be happy. But I think we should stop embarrassing her for a while. She still isn't over your Uncle Jared."

He remembered the weeks of Rhoda being sad because of Jared. Crying because of Jared. Always looking back because of Jared.

In a flash of insight, it hit him.  _Rhoda is still in love with Jared_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you want to see how Penny and Coco look like: https://www.deviantart.com/donutsarelife/art/Lil-Penny-and-Coco-the-Fleischer-Kids-776778685. Once again, they belong to Donutsforlife of Deviantart.  
> Why is Bertie Boop (man Betty Boop) married to Poppy (woman Popeye)? Click this to find out: https://www.deviantart.com/donutsarelife/art/Max-Fleischer-Toon-Family-Photo-1947-722396185  
> Who is Koko the Clown (girl Koko the Clown)? Man, you’re missing out from true classics, click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDATXtewPrg  
> If you don’t know Jack and Rose, they’re present in my other fics in fanfiction.net . In this universe, they don’t exist.  
> Hope you're all having an energized midweek :D


	11. Experience can be Enlightened

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Mr. Krupnick, there's something we've never told anyone before about Aunt Rhoda. But I think you need to know."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The two new characters in this chapter belongs to Donutsforlife of Deviantart. She edited parts of this chapter and the next. Checkout her gallery, guys: https://www.deviantart.com/donutsarelife/art/Lil-Penny-and-Coco-the-Fleischer-Kids-776778685

Coco made a face, a face of disgust and insult. "That useless pile of paint isn't our uncle, I'd rather drink Dip that call im' family." he grumbled, composing himself by twisting and pulling his hat as a way to diffuse.

Penny shifted, rubbing her arm. "There's something about him that rubs us off the nose. He's not exactly being a bad bean-"

"It's because we're black and white toons, Penny. He sits his painted arse on his high horse, lookin' down on our parents, and us! you don't have to be nice ta him, he's never been nice to you."

Coco glanced at Mr. Krupnick. There was a light frown in his eyes. Hope soared in Coco's chest. Mr. Krupnick might take them seriously. He decided to up the stakes.

"Mr. Krupnick, there's something we've never told anyone before. But I think you need to know."

Penny's eyes widened. "Are ya sure, Coco?" She glanced behind her back to check if their Aunt Rhoda was still preoccupied. They could hear her screaming as though getting dragged by Jacques galloping around the lawn.

"I..." Coco's pierrot hat twisted in worry as he tried to remember three years ago, "...where do I even begin?"

Penny paused. Where would they exactly begin when Mr. Jared didn't exactly act like a bad guy in a TV show?

**XOXOXOXO**

_Three years ago…_

Penny hesitantly followed Coco as he stamped into his room.

"That… that… uuurrggh!" he snarled, his fingers curling into quavering claws. "That fopdoodle ruined Ma's birthday!"

She sat on the bed, fidgeting. "C'mon, junyah, it ain't that bad. We still had cake."

"He barely even looked at our parents' direction. At our direction!" he paced. "It's like he didn't even want to be there!"

She couldn't deny that. At first she and Coco were excited to see him because he looked like Coco's idol, Jesse Krupnick. But Mr. Jared barely talked to them. Aunt Rhoda must've sensed his disinterest because she kept trying to include him to their conversations.

Penny pouted. "Ah'm sure Aunt Rhoda just wanted him to be part of her life." She glanced outside to see Aunt Rhoda and Jared entering their car.

Coco snorted, gesturing around the black-and-white part of ToonTown. "Well, he sure didn't like this part."

Penny winced, remembering how Mr. Jared kept pointing out colors to them. Even when Rhoda explained that monochrome toons weren't colorblind.

" _So what're you really?" Mr. Jared asked to her father. "Didn't you used to be a dog?"_

_Penny could see Aunt Rhoda looking horrified before frantically shaking her head to him. If Mr. Jared noticed, he didn't show it._

Coco smirked. "You know what? Aunt Rhoda looked calm. But I can tell she's  _furious_ _._ "

Penny wanted to disagree. Aunt Rhoda looked more like she was going to cry.

He rubbed his hands together indicating to Penny that he was up to something.

"Uh… junyah?"

"Cool your guns, cuz. It's nothin' bad," he said, opening the birdcage in his room. The parrot cawed, hopping into his outstretched arm. "Cole is just gonna eavesdrop on Aunt Rhoda ripping that scamp a new one."

"Cole is just gonna eavesdrop on Aunt Rhoda ripping that scamp a new one," Cole mimicked in Coco's baritone.

Coco signed with his hands so that Cole won't repeat what he would say. "He could record every tone, every emotion of someone else," he excitedly spoke with his hands.

He let Cole out of the window. "Go to Aunt Rhoda and come back."

"Go to Aunt Rhoda and come back," Cole repeated, flapping his inky wings.

They watched him fly away until he was a dot in the sky. Coco grinned at Penny.

"We ain't gonna be caught if we're never there."

Night came. Penny and her parents went back to their house next to Coco's family. She wondered if Cole had came back. But if he did, she was pretty sure that Coco would call her.

By the time she was in bed and her eyes were beginning to close, she figured Cole would appear in the morning.

"Pssst! Penny!"

She sat up. Her eyes fell on Coco's window facing hers. Worry gripped her at the panic in his eyes.

"Junyah, what's wrong?"

"It's Cole! He's- never mind, c'mere." He reached for her window ledge, stretching his torso. Penny climbed him like a tightrope, almost tripping into his bedroom.

She gasped upon seeing Cole. The parrot's eyes were glazed. Hacks and coughs spurted from his open beak as he twitched and quavered.

"What's wrong with him?" she whispered.

"I dunno! He just came back all funny -and not in a good way."

Monochrome feathers molt down to the floor. Penny began to whimper when his body began to drip with ink.

Gulping nervously, Coco tapped Cole's beak. Cole jerked and his beak moved as Aunt Rhoda's voice spoke out.

"Jared, we need to talk."

Mr. Jared's sigh came out of Cole. "Can't it wait until tomorrow? I'm tired."

"We have to talk now, Jared! What you did back there was upsetting!"

"What?" he asked, his tone colored with disbelief. "What did I even do now?"

"The way you treated my friends back there! They're my friends, Jared!" Cole momentarily burst into furious flames. "You DON'T tell Koko or Pierre to stop signing with their hands! They came from an age of silent cartoons! They still talk to you with their voice!"

Penny stepped back in shock. She knew Aunt Rhoda could be loud. But this was a different kind of loud. They heard her give a sniff of someone holding back tears.

"And I CAN'T believe you! Bertie is one of the sweetest guys I know and you just asked him  _what_ he was. You were lucky Bertie was very understanding, Poppy looked like she was gonna punch ya!"

Coco smirked, trying to mop the ink from Cole's dripping feathers. If they had thought that she was mad before, her voice only got more inflamed.

"And the kids! You didn't even say hi to them! You didn't even look like you wanted to talk to them! We were their guests Jared, and I've never been so embarrassed in my life! They already had a lot of flak from colored toons and YOU JUST HAVE TO DO THAT TO 'EM!"

There was a pulse of silence from Cole's parted beak, saved for her heavy breathing. She sniffed back some more and Penny could imagine her wiping away her own tears.

"Are you done?" asked Mr. Jared.

"I want you to come with me tomorrow and apologize-"

"For what? For asking Bertie a question?"

"You asked him if he was a dog-"

"So? He was, before Fleischer turned him humanoid." There was a sigh. "I don't know what your problem is." His voice became patient. "Aren't you just overreacting?"

Penny's mouth hung open. She had felt insulted when Mr. Jared asked her father that question. But it was just a question. Right?

"But the way you said it-"

"The  _way_ I said it?" Mr. Jared laughed. "Really?"

Penny squeezed her hands together, trying to remember the scenario. Aunt Rhoda was right. But Mr. Jared didn't seem to notice it. Had they been imagining Mr. Jared's tone?

"And the way  _I_  treated  _your_  friends?" he asked, incredulous. "Haven't you been paying attention to the way they treated  _me_?"

"What?"

Cole's beak clicked with a snort. "Your two clown friends were alienating me. But did you notice that? Of course not, you only see the bad that I do."

Penny could hear Coco growl. She hugged herself worriedly. Were Aunt KoKo and Uncle Pierre unintentionally being rude?

Aunt Rhoda began to speak. "I-I don't… They're not alienating you, that's just how they are."

"Wow, I can't imagine how many people they've weirded out before. Black-and-whites never liked coloreds, what do you expect?"

"They don't-"

"Isn't Boop a washed-up adonis? Of course, they'd hate me."

"They don't..."

There was disbelieving laugh. "What do you know, Rhoda? I always have to read people's intentions for you."

"They don't hate you," she spoke again, her tone begging to be believed.

He spoke, amused and almost mocking. "Alright, Rhoda."

"They got hurt by what you did," she said, pleading. "We should go back and apologize."

"Are you even seeing my side? This is so just like you."

"What?"

"You do this every time." There was a huff. "We go around and around in circles. You pretend to listen so that you would get your way. Then I have to explain myself to you again."

"No! That's not what I'm trying to do! Jared, p-p-p-please-"

There was a sigh of a reasonable man losing his patience. "It's not my fault they chose to react like that."

Cole's beak clicked with the sound of someone sitting on a sofa.

"Okay, what else? What else did I do wrong?"

"I… "

Penny's heart sank. From the vibrantly angry tone Aunt Rhoda had used, this one was small. Lost.

"I'm sorry."

"You should be, you're the one who was screaming at me the moment we got home."

There was a pulse of silence. Penny could almost imagine the shame in Aunt Rhoda's face.

Cole's beak opened and closed with the sounds of footsteps leaving. A door slammed close.

They could only hear someone breathing. The silence stretched. The breathing got heavier and heavier.

Just when they thought it was over, Cole's eyes began to bleed with ink. It blotted the floor as feathers dripped and molted.

Penny put a hand over her mouth, her eyes tearing at his silent agony.

The parrot opened his beak in a silent, quavering wail before slopping into an inky mess on Coco's bedroom floor.

The lights on both houses turned on as Penny screamed.

**XOXOXOXO**

_Back to the present…_

"We don't know how to explain it to ya, but Mr. Jared is bad news!" Coco said in frustration.

He looked at Penny for guidance but she also shrugged, lost. What were they going to say? Mr. Jared was a bad man because he used the wrong kind of tone?

"He's poison!" Coco continued. "But Aunt Rhoda thinks he's Benny Crocker! He makes her apologize for things she shouldn't be apologizing for! Like- like-"

His mind tried to scramble for the words.

"Like the time he was rude to uncle Bertie!"

"But he said he didn't mean it," Penny said uncertainly.

"And he said my parents were estranging him!"

"But maybe that was just a miscommunication?"

"Urrgh!" he growled, clutching his hat. "We swear! He was being mean!"

"We knew he was in the wrong!" she spoke up, bouncing. "My heart's tellin' me he's in the wrong. But whenever we try to tell it, it just doesn't seem like a big deal!"

Coco inwardly panicked at seeing the concern in Mr. Krupnick's face. But it looked more like concern for them instead for their aunt.

"He made her cry," he finally said.

"Junyah, we didn't exactly-"

"The day she came over to apologize about Jared, she was miserable. I could see it in her eyes."

Coco looked down. Aunt Rhoda could act like a skippy, happy pony all day. But the air around her had felt like an old gray mare when she explained that Jared wasn't used to being around monochrome toons.

After that, Aunt Rhoda never brought Jared with her when she would visit the monochrome part of ToonTown. Coco and Penny's parents seemed to have an unspoken agreement never to talk about Jared with her.

He loved Aunt Rhoda. She was a glutton for slapstick just to make people laugh and she was the few people who could keep up with Penny's bubbly energy. But there were some things that were beyond his and Penny's control.

"We always have our fingers and toes crossed that they won't tie the knot," Penny said.

Coco took out a mallet, "We're going to take on drastic measures if they ever do, but now we're pretty sure we . . . don't need to."

Mr. Krupnick backed away a little. "I'm glad you didn't have to."

"That's the problem with Aunt Rhoda, she cares too much to the point of..." Coco said. He sneaked a glance at Penny, who was almost the same, having a heart that was always open twenty-four seven. Flittingly, he hoped Penny wouldn't meet someone like that guy.

"I'm glad that she's away from him," Coco said. "But knowing Aunt Rhoda, I feel like that shabaroon has a hold on her."

**XOXOXOXO**

As Penny and Coco went home, Rhoda waved to them one last time.

"Kids, they grow up so fast," she sighed.

Jesse nodded in agreement. Before they left, Coco gave him a nod while Penny gave him a pleading look at Rhoda's direction. Their message was simple: please, take care of their aunt.

Rhoda laughed a little. "I'm sorry about Penny tryin' to matchmake us."

"It's nothing."

"I haven't forgotten what I said before," she said, turning to him. "I know you're not interested and I told you that I'll leave you alone."

Jesse quieted, watching her.

"I ain't one of those weird, pushy people who can't take no for an answer. Besides..."

 _You're still in love with Jared,_  he continued for her.

"Say, is your girlfriend -or boyfriend- okay with this?"

"I'm not seeing anyone right now."

"Oh." She put on her toolbelt. "Let's get to work then! The sooner I can move out, the sooner I don't have to overstay with ya!"

Ever since Rhoda came, he knew he was just beginning to know her again. The past few weeks had been crazy. But wonderful. Just like how things would usually be around her.

For a moment, he didn't mind if they slowed a little bit with fixing her home.

**XOXOXOXO**

Jared always threw away things that he had no use for.

But there were clippings all over his vanity mirror. Little pieces of information he had been feeding reporters. Rhoda's instability. Her jealousy. Insecurity.

Her disappearance to not take responsibility.

The most recent clipping didn't come from him. It was from last week's paper, some toon detective solving a case. It was gray and grainy. But there was no mistaking those pigtails. He still remembered what Rhoda looked like as a humanoid toon.

Her eyes were casted down. Every detail of her clothes and accessories were faithful to her original design. Beside her, was a humanoid toon that looked like him, Jesse Krupnick.

_Whatever, I'm the improved version._

Krupnick's arm was around her shoulders as if he could protect her from being involved with whatever crime that had happened there.

He rolled his eyes. Rhoda never had the capability to take care of herself. Unlike him. He had singlehandedly left his overcontrolling artist and survived on his own. He got Rhoda who could give him the life that he wanted. Everything was exactly the way he wanted it. He was now able to do what he wish, whenever he wanted to.

People who weren't happy for him? Were disposable. After everything he went through, he deserved whatever he desired.

But Rhoda had always been prude and hysterical. He always had to set her straight from herself. From her friends. From her family. He had always kept her in line. If it wasn't for him, they wouldn't've lasted.

Then she left him.

That wasn't part of the plan. That wasn't what he wanted.

He couldn't wait for her to go down. And stay down. He deserved his success in Maroon Cartoon Studio. She didn't.

He smirked at the clipping, seeing the toon beside her that could almost be his twin. In fact, he knew exactly where she would be tomorrow.

"Oh, Rhoda. You're making this far too easy."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh right, while waiting for the next chapter, just drop a comment to request links to:
> 
> -The story of Penny, Coco, Jack and Rose here (Donuts and I's work)
> 
> -You can also read the au where Jack and Rose exists, if you haven't read it yet
> 
> DonutsforLife of Deviantart has also made wonderful art of the characters! Just drop a comment to request for their links:
> 
> -Penny and Coco as kids
> 
> -Penny and Coco as teenagers
> 
> -Penny and Coco as grownups
> 
> -Jack and Rose
> 
> -Jack, Rose, Penny and Coco in Technicolor Monochrome
> 
> -Jack, Rose, Penny and Coco went shopping


	12. Fallacies Can Be Faced

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Slowly, she turned around, her stomach twisting. Please, not him...

Rhoda was starting to worry if she and Jesse were going through a weird phase.

_Or maybe I'm just imagining things?_

Last night, she couldn't help but notice that Jesse was quieter. More distant.

_It couldn't be something that I said… could it?_

She shook her head. All she had told him was that she still respected his decision to reject her.

Her eyes widened.  _Did Coco and Penny say something to him?_

She shrugged off the question. Jesse seemed to get along pretty well with them. She hoped they would meet him again. Her "niece and nephew" deserved grownups that they could look up to. They were starting to grow bigger than her anyway.

But all her musings weren't shedding light on Jesse's abrupt coolness in their camaraderie.

_It was like he was suddenly withdrawn._

She never thought grocery shopping would offer them a break from each other. Wednesday was her favorite day for shopping. No crowds and the shelves were stocked to the fullest.

Rhoda was in the produce section while Jesse went off to the the detergent aisle. She didn't miss the fact that he chose the aisle that was purposefully far away from hers.

 _Maybe I am overstaying my welcome,_ she thought as she stood perched on one of the vegetable stands.

She sighed and the lettuce she was holding wilted in disappointment. Had she been expecting something else in their friendship?

_If I'm going to be honest with myself…_

"What're you doing here?"

She froze. She would know that drawl anywhere.

Slowly, she turned around, her stomach twisting.  _Please, not him..._

"Seems like you're done hiding."

Her lips pressed tightly together. She couldn't even deny it and he was right. Her eyes stayed down, refusing to engage. Much to her dismay, he was blocking her path to her grocery cart.

"Wow, you're not even going to say hello."

Anger roiled inside her. But maybe, maybe he could still be reasoned with.

She forced herself to look at him. "Hello, Jared."

"How're you?"

Her mouth dropped open. "How am I?" she echoed. "After what you've said to the press about me, you're going to ask me how I am?" she demanded, trying not to raise her voice.

Jared patiently sighed. "I can't talk to you. Because I don't know where you are," he replied, with an air of explaining one plus one. "So I have to talk to them. In the hopes that it will reach you."

"I've never been possessive of you! And why would you tell others those things about me?"

He sighed, shaking his head. "You were always like this, Rhoda."

She wanted him not to change the subject. But they could do that later, she'd rather confront what was he thinking now.

"What?"

"You overreact and I would have to explain why to others," pointedly gesturing at her heated stance.

Her shoulders drooped and she looked away, ashamed. The pulse in her head pounded. Taking a deep breath, she tried to calm herself down.

"I don't overreact," she gritted. She could hear him snort.

"Oh you're not? Then who was the one who was always screaming and crying?"

Something inside her cracked. The feeling of deja vu casted over her, trapped.

"You go crazy at me, then at the flip of a coin, everyone's acting like you're a trodden puppy."

She stepped back, her mind flashing to Edna. To Ash. To Jesse.

"I didn't go crazy at you. Jared, I cared!"

"If you did, you wouldn't've left."

She rapidly blinked, a lumped forming in her throat. She stepped back even more as he stepped closer.

"You really are good at getting everyone's sympathy."

She could feel his eyes on her. Her hand clutched her other arm, forming a shield between them.

"I… I didn't. They -they're my friends. They care about me-"

"You mean that detective who wanted to use you for your tooniness? Or you're co-workers who would talk behind your back?"

"She's not using me! Edna didn't even like me to be there."

"No wonder. You can be such a problem," he ticked off his fingers. "You can't do your lines right. People feel sorry for you. I'm the only one who was ever there for you and yet-"

She shrunk away, already knowing what he would say next.

"Aaugh!" she yelped as her foot moved over the edge of the vegetable stand.

Her arms windmilled as she fell back. Only to be caught by a pair of arms from behind.

**XOXOXOXOXO**

After his flash of insight yesterday, Jesse thought it was best to step back.

Rhoda was still grieving and he wanted to be there. But he knew he had to respect some boundaries.

Jesse walked back to their grocery cart, detergent in hand. He thought it was best to get the furthest ones first.

He passed by a pair of toon ladies who giggled.

"We've been blessed! There's two of them."

His feet stopped, glancing back at their retreating figures.

_Two of them?_

There were so many ways to interpret what the woman said. For some reason, his mind landed to the most absurd and he brushed it away. Even if Jared had never been with them, it felt like he was with Rhoda always-

He almost dropped his wares at the sight of them talking together.

Jesse stepped back. He didn't like it one bit. He didn't like the feeling twisting in his chest.

The right thing to do was to give them space.

But something was wrong.

Rhoda's back was turned from him, her shoulders hunched. All he could see was the gleam in Jared's eyes, similar to someone pulling out an insect's wings.

Without thinking, he strode forward.

"No wonder. You can be such a problem," he could hear Jared speak. "You can't do your lines right. People feel sorry for you. I'm the only one who was ever there for you and yet-"

Rhoda seemed to flinch at every tick of his finger.

"Aaugh!" she yelled in surprise, teetering backwards.

Jesse caught her just in time and Rhoda looked up to him in shock.

But he wasn't staring back at Rhoda. He was looking directly at Jared who was still wearing his self-satisfied smirk.

 _He's poison!_  Coco's voice warned in his memories.  _But Aunt Rhoda thinks he's Benny Crocker!_

He glanced down at Rhoda who was still in his arms. Whether she wanted to show it or not, her eyes looked raw and wet.

When Coco said Jared made Rhoda cry, he knew there were times people cry in relationships. He would have to apologize to both Coco and Penny for giving Jared the benefit of a doubt.

"Nice of you to get my hand-me-down, Jesse."

The very air of the grocery mart misted with frost. His fist seized but yellow-gloved hands clamped down on both of his arms.

Jesse looked down on Rhoda, stunned.  _Why're you still protecting him?_

His thoughts darkened and if he couldn't wish him pain, he knew exactly what would vex him.

"Hand-me-down?" He regarded him down his nose. "I'm her upgrade next to you."

Righting her up, he cupped the back of her head and kissed her. He ignored the tickling brush of her whiskers. The jolt when their lips touched.

Then it was over.

"Let's go, honey," he said, leading her away from the shocked and furious Jared.

**XOXOXOXOX**

She didn't want to think about it.

Rhoda sat ramrod straight throughout the car ride on the way home.

She firmly shut out the thoughts flying inside her head. Her parents had died in a car crash. She didn't want to distract Jesse from driving for whatever possessed him to kiss her for show.

By the time his car parked inside his garage, Rhoda got out. They weren't able to shop a thing, their cart abandoned behind Jared. Jesse followed her inside the house.

"What was that about?!" she asked, the moment he closed the door.

His face remained unexpressive. "I know Jared. He's relishing his hold on you. So I got back at him."

"By forcing a kiss on me?!"

His impassive eyes flickered. He paused.

"You don't know Jared, I do! He's going to smear you to the press! He's going to-" She stopped, her eyes widening.

"I dragged you into my mess." A lump formed in her throat at what she had cost him. Ash had been in Jared's libel list. She didn't want Jesse to be next.

_This is all my fault._

Jesse stepped closer. "Rhoda, I don't care what he'll say."

"I dragged you into my mess," she repeated, distractedly running a hand over her hair and rabbit ears.

 _No wonder,_ Jared's voice retorted in her head.  _You can be such a problem._

"This is a mistake."

"What?"

Her hand gestured around. "Staying here with you has been a mistake."

"Rhoda, wait."

She turned to him, remembering their kiss. Her chest hurt.  _It must be so lucky to be like you and not feel a thing_. Maybe Jared was right. People pitied her so much that they would stoop so low on her behalf.

He made to hold her hand, but hesitated. "You don't have to go."

She exhaled, stepping back. They had crossed a line. He had crossed a line. She turned to go to the guest room.

As soon as she shut the door, her breathing became fast and heavy. She leaned against the wall, trying to rein in her hyperventilation.

_Calm down. Please, calm down._

She teared, finally releasing sobs she couldn't show in the grocery mart.

 _If you cared, you wouldn't've left,_  Jared corrected inside her head.

She curled against the wall, her shoulders shaking. She pressed her ears against her leaking eyes.

_I'm so sorry._

She didn't know to whom she was apologizing. To Jesse, who felt obligated to get back at Jared? For not letting him punch him?

She couldn't. Jared was still the guy in her memories who laughed at little things. Who once pronounced "bon appetit" wrong. Who treated her like a gentleman when she wasn't in the mood.

To herself, for having a meltdown again?

She looked at her trembling hands, wondering where had all her progress gone to.  _I thought I'm okay. I was doing okay._ She remembered all the times she had been happy for the last couple of weeks. They all felt far away now.

Or to Jared, for letting him down?

She knew Jared had his faults. So why was everything her fault?

Maybe she never really cared.

Tears dropped down her lap as she muffled her sobs.

 _But I did care, Jared! Why can't you see that?_ Her hands clenched.  _Everything I did, I did it for you._

She sat there in a daze, her mind going around like a broken record through their arguments. What he would say. What she would've said. Round and round like a merry-go-round. A mess that she couldn't fix, so she left. What kind of a person was she?

Her head ached until she couldn't take it anymore.

She packed up what she could, just going through the motions.

 _He's relishing his hold on you,_  Jesse had said.

Rhoda tiredly frowned. Her hands found the dress Aurelius made for her, causing her heart to stop momentarily.

_He's going to the event._

The Maroon Cartoon Anniversary Ball. Three days away. She almost forgot that she had to go, being one of its top stars.

 _The investors. The superiors. Everyone would be there,_  she thought. Her mind wondered in horror how she would be in front of them once Jared would try to talk to her again.

If she would cause a scene, she would get in worse trouble with Maroon.

She bit her lip.  _Didn't Maroon said she would probably let me go?_

Her hands stuffed the dress into the suitcase and shut it. She didn't want to think. She didn't want to think what would happen. Or how she had acted in the grocery mart. Or that Jesse had used her to get back at Jared.

Or her current emotional state after seeing him.

When she got out of the guest room, Jesse was still waiting for her downstairs.

As soon as she stepped down the stairs, he knelt down to her eye level. She avoided his gaze.

"Rhoda, I..." He made to touch her, but stopped. She didn't think his hesitance was necessary. It was clear to her that he wasn't attracted to her in any way.

"I'm sorry for what I did."

She didn't know how to respond. Jared had cut her with so many words. But it was Jesse that she didn't feel like immediately forgiving.

"Can you take care of Jacques for me?" She wondered what kind of a person was she to use him back. "I promise I'll come back for him."

When she got out of Jesse's house, Jacques followed her.

"No, Jacques. Stay."

Jacques whined, romping along her side. Rhoda cupped his face.

"You need to stay with Jesse."

He nosed her tummy, whimpering.

"Oh Jacques, you know I'm not really fit to be with a dog. Not right now." She ruffled his fur. "I tried and it didn't work out." Her last words made her glance back at the house, wondering if she was still talking about being with a dog.

_I'm over you. I should be over you._

Jacques circled her and wagged his tail, waiting for her to lead the way. Rhoda steeled herself for what she had to do next.

"Jacques, go! Just go to Jesse and stop following me, you hear me?! Go!"

He lowered himself, whining. Rhoda bit back the hurt that she was going to inflict them both.

"Bad dog! Just GO!"

Whimpering, he scampered back to the house.

She rubbed her eyes, walking away from Faded Lines Street.

It would be three more days before she had to face Jared again.

 _Coffee,_  her mind begged.

This time, she obeyed. 


	13. Clarity Can Be Caught

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jacques was gone. She was alone. Caffeine clutched her with the jitters of nauseous insomnia.
> 
> She sat on her old bed, waiting for the bad thoughts to come.

**Chapter 13: Clarity can be Caught**

She felt like she got hit by a truck.

Rhoda groaned, waking up from the floor. Afternoon sun flitted light through the blinds of her parent's farmhouse. Briefly, she wondered who she was.

"Jeepers," she muttered, clamping hands on both of her throbbing temples.

It would be two days before she had to meet Jared again.

Her body creaked with weary joints. Half-finished chores cluttered over a layer of dust -a product of her hyperactive airing of her parents' Kansas home. She followed the trail of empty coffee bags.

The old taste of brew soiled the inside of her mouth. Wiping a hand over swollen eyes, she tried to take an inventory of what had happened yesterday.

_Bought lots of ground beans. And a coffee maker. Went to Kansas. Brewed, so much. Aired the house. Or at least tried to. Blur. Fainted around 4 A.M._

Rhoda stepped over the set of strewn plates she had meant to dust. And the bundle of cobwebbed curtains she had meant to launder. And the sponge and a bucket of water she had meant to clean the windows with.

Her heart still pounded from premium roast. Her hands trembled for more.

She didn't want to think as her eyes flickered to the unused bags of fresh ground coffee.

Again, she finished nothing of what she wanted to do.

Pandemonium trashed the rooms of more unfinished chores by the time Rhoda found herself, arms-around-her-knees, in the shower. She didn't even know what time it was anymore.

When she collapsed in her old room, all she wanted to do was sleep as she chugged her 25th mug.

Exhausted, sleep evaded her (she wondered why). She wanted to avoid the thoughts that Jacques held at bay through the comfort of his warmth.

However, Jacques was gone. She was alone. Caffeine clutched her with the jitters of nauseous insomnia.

She sat on her old bed, waiting for the thoughts to come.

Her mind went back to Jared. Their good times together. Their bad times together. What she knew. What Jared knew, countering what she thought she knew.

_Who was right? Who was wrong?_

_What is real?_

_Am I crazy?_

Someone once said they could never guess what was in her head.

Her eyes became heavy yet her thoughts thrived, persistent as weeds.

**XOXOXOXO**

Her thoughts had gone wild.

Was she dreaming?

Wearing blue overalls, she skipped down the yellow brick road. On her side was Ash in his Tin Man armor. On his shoulder was his broom he would use in his movie. Aurelius with his flowing mane of curls was on her other side, wearing a tan fur coat. Frost White, the scarecrow, sang with the birds as Jacques led the way.

Mina, the munchkin appeared, pointing at a foreboding castle ahead of them.

"Behold, the Wicked (bleep) of the West!"

"Don't you mean witch?"

"I said what I said."

Rhoda froze, knowing who she would meet again.

Everything darkened. Her friends vanished as she looked around wildly.

"Ash? Mina? Jacques?"

The ground opened into a rabbit hole and she dropped, her screams following her on the way down.

"Aaaaaauuuugh!"

Her fall ended when she crashed a rabbit-shaped hole in the ground. Groaning, she climbed out, wearing Victorian clothes of a schoolboy.

"Where am I?"

She looked like she was in a large sitting room with no doors out. Her eyes looked back to the rabbit hole she had came from, looking like a sole star in the underground's darkness.

_Looks like I hit rock bottom._

Something in the corner caught her eye, and she crouched down for a better look. It was a mouse hole door. When she peeked through its glass window, she could see a sunlit garden.

"Wait! I'm gonna be late!" She paused, looking down at herself. "Or am I the one chasing myself?"

She looked around. "There must be something in here that can make me small..."

The scent of carrot cake hit her nose, and she looked at the table beside her. It looked exactly like how Jared used to bake them.

Her eyes watered at the sight, remembering kisses of cream and cinnamon. And lies when she found out to whom else he would bake them for.

Tears flooded out of her as she sobbed. She breathed in, trying to gain control. But her tears only kept coming.

She bawled, no longer fighting it. The more that she cried, the smaller she became.

Finally, her tears buoyed her. She paddled, hiccuping.

The mouse hole door burst open from the pressure. Like a flushing toilet, the torrent swept her out as she screamed in surprise.

Coughing, she found herself drifted underneath a mushroom.

"Hey there, rabbit."

Squeezing the water out of her ears, she peeped above the toadstool.

It was Edna smoking a hookah. When she looked closer, her hookah was filled with jellybeans.

"You vape? Surely, you jape," Rhoda commented wryly.

Edna inhaled the fruity vapors. "State your business."

Rhoda balanced on the tips of her toes to hover above the mushroom's head. "I'd feel better if I'm a li'l bit bigger."

"Is that how you feel about yourself?"

Her brows knitted in confusion. "It's how I am right now."

Edna blew smoke on her. "Maybe because you're looking at yourself through a haze."

"You're not exactly helping," Rhoda coughed, using her hand to fan away the smoke.

"What do you know, Purple Eyes?"

"My eyes aren't purple!... Are they?"

Edna snorted red and blue vapors. "You're worse than I thought." She tossed her a small mushroom. "Change of view," she said, like a doctor prescribing a medicine.

Shrugging, Rhoda gulped it down. She almost wretched at the taste of sweat of slaving artists.

"Wait! Don't just-"

Too late. Rhoda exploded in size, becoming a humanoid toon. She blinked in shock, finding herself in a tea party.

She looked down at her extra fifth fingers. "Not again," she groaned.

"Here ya go!"

Someone poured tea into her cup. When she looked up, it was Penny the Hatter. Wisps of tea mingled in the air, smelling of jasmine and orange.

Her heart twisted with the memories of his care. She drank it. With a poof, she turned back into a rabbit.

" _[I'm a Beanbag](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQqXvwi430Q)_

_A Beanbag_

_A flippity floppity beanbag!_ "

Penny sang as she danced on top of the table, maneuvering around tea cups and cakes. Besides Rhoda, Coco the March Hare looked more sullen than usual, having to wear an Easter Bunny suit.

"Whoa, careful!" Rhoda said as Penny danced too close to a cracked cup. They all flinched when it jolted off the table and crashed into pieces.

Penny's lip trembled. "Awe, poor thing." She dropped down beside the fragments about to scoop them with her hands.

"Don't touch it," Rhoda cautioned.

Coco swept the pieces away with a broom and an actual pan. "You care a lot. But it shouldn't be at your expense."

"He's right, Penny."

Coco baldly looked at her. "I wasn't talkin' to her."

Almost like an impulse, he and Penny smashed down a button, causing Rhoda's seat to eject her high into the sky.

Rhoda and her screams arched through the air. Then gravity decided that she must come down.

"OOF! Ow! Ooof! Aurgh! Ow!" she articulated as she hit a tree branch after tree branch.

After getting acquainted with the tree's limbs, fate introduced Rhoda to its roots in an explosion of stars.

Lumped and bruised, she sat up, as bright as a chewed up dog toy. "I feel so close to Mother Nature."

She stood up and looked around. Confusion gripped her when she heard purring.

Her ears swept the air, trying to find the source. She looked up into the trees.

A form of a humanoid toon slowly appeared, perched on the branches. His green eyes were catlike. His suit striped and velvet like that of a tabby feline.

She cocked her head at the knowing grin in his lips.

Her chest twinged, remembering her last encounter with Jesse.

"You confuse me," she stated.

Jesse said nothing but the flick of his tail.

"But there's nothing to talk about, is there?" she asked. "Just don't do it again."

With those words in mind in case she met the actual Jesse again, Rhoda climbed the tree.

 _I'm lost. I need to see where I am;_  she thought. Hooking her arm around a sturdy branch, her feet scrabbled to follow.

One branch after another, she finally found a height of her liking. Making herself at home, she sat close to the trunk and looked at the view.

She could see the Mad Hatter and the March Hare continuing their tea party. The Mad Hatter was now trying to balance a stack of cups on her companion's head.

"I can see why you like it here," Rhoda spoke. "You can see everything."

The Cheshire Cat slowly vanished from sight.

"But doesn't it make you feel lonely? Being detached from everyone else?" she continued as his head remained visible.

He finally turned to her as everything but his eyes disappeared. They seemed to crinkle at her with kindness.

The Cheshire Cat's eyes floated dreamlike towards her direction. Gradually, his body materialized, floating to sit down next to her.

"Is that what you're afraid of? Being out of touch?" he asked with a grin.

She rested against his shoulder. "I don't know how you can bear with it."

He tilted her chin up, meeting her eyes. "Who said I didn't care?"

Confused, she leaned back. Jesse vanished. The trees vanished. Checkerboard grass grew beneath her feet in white and red, each square as wide as a cottage.

"Ash! Mina!" she cried, finally seeing her friends.

But like chess pieces, they slid further away from her.

"Mater! Pater! Wait!" she pleaded as they faded away.

Her breath grew rapid. She was alone.

The ground trembled. Rhoda screamed in surprise when the earth cracked open, revealing the King of Hearts.

"Jared!" she gasped.

Thorned vines slithered out, its roses dripping red. Inside the barbed monstrosity, she could see Jared imprisoned, yet commanding it at the same time. Spikes pricked and tore at her dress as she tried to tug them away from him.

"Get out of there! It's hurting y- aaugh!"

She struggled, wincing. The climbing roses encircled her wrists. Her waist. Her ankles. Jared only smirked, unmindful of the thorns.

"Jared, p-p-p-p-please..." she whimpered as the vines forced her into a bow before him.

He unsheathed the sword on his hip. "Off," he drawled, "with her head."

"Mater… Pater..." she gasped. Searing pain ran down her face in tears. "Jesse..."

Green feline eyes gradually materialize into view.

"Detach, Rhoda."

She whimpered, feeling the blade of a sword at the back of her neck. "I can't. I'm not like you."

"Detach."

The sword swung down into an arc.

Rhoda's eyes widened, struck.

She could feel herself floating. When she looked down, she couldn't see her hands. Or the rest of her body. Instead, she saw it from afar. Jared standing tall above what remained of her. She gazed at them for a long time.

She wondered if that was how they had always been.

**XOXOXOXO**

It was one in the morning by the time Jesse got home. He sighed, having turned down an offer to join the table of his admirers in the club.

 _How can you say no to that?_  Duchess, the owner of Ink-and-Paint Club, had asked. Especially after they had sent him gifts.

They were rich. They were old. They were powerful. And they were lonely. Years ago, he would have agreed for another meetup. He knew the ropes. He could predict their expectations and what they would want from him. But after what had happened with Acme, he'd rather not get too close again.

Instead, his mind wandered to Rhoda, pondering if she was alright wherever she was.

The phone rang. He wondered who could it be. Puzzled, he went to answer it.

"Hello?"

"Jesse?"

His heart skipped a beat.

"Rhoda?"

"I'm sorry for calling-"

"Don't ever apologize," he replied, getting a hunch where she might have gotten her habit of constantly saying sorry.

"Huh?"

"I'm glad you called. Are you alright?"

There was a pulse of silence. "I'm fine. How's Jacques?"

He gripped the phone closer. "Missing you."

The silence stretched longer.

"Can I… can I talk to you?"

Hope brightened in his chest. "Of course."

He heard her inhale, hesitating. "Can I come over?"

His fingers momentarily clenched the phone cord. "What about your tooning?"

She winced. "I can do it. It's how I got here in Kansas."

Holding the phone's handset at arm's length, Jesse waited.

Moments later a lump crawled from the phone's plug to its cord and finally to the handset. Rhoda slipped out and fell on all fours, tenderly holding her side.

Jesse knelt down beside her. "You didn't have to do that if it hurts."

"I have to. I need you."

She yelped in surprise when he hugged her. He smiled in apology when she gave him a questioning look. Jesse wasn't one for impulses.

"Sorry," he said, sweeping her bangs. "I'm just glad you're alright."

She hugged him back. "I still don't like what you did."

"I'm really sorry about that." He rubbed her back. "I shouldn't have let him get me."

Rhoda smiled, making him feel like his day had finally ended well. He helped her up and led her to the kitchen.

She looked beaten. Tired. She rubbed her arm, her eyes reflecting grinding gears in her head.

"You said you've known Jared, right?"

He nodded, setting down two mugs. Turning on the stove, he put the kettle on.

"I've known him for a long time. I just want to know if I'm seeing things right."

"Okay," he agreed, getting out a tin of jasmine tea.

She clutched her mug uncertainly. "But before I tell you my whole story, promise me you won't get mad."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it for today, guys. What do you think of Rhoda's thoughts running wild with the binary swap Wizard of Oz and the binary swap Alice in Wonderland?


	14. Resolve Can Be Renewed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "If I want to get over Jesse, I might've to sell my cottage and move somewhere else." Rhoda nodded to herself. Her hands wrung each other. "Do I have to tell him WHY I'll be moving out?"

She didn't know where to begin.

"I know Jared. He can be sweet. He can be lovable. We do have good times together, you know." Her hands fidgeted. "There are just times that he can be…" she paused, trying to capture the right word. "Like that."

Jesse only rolled his eyes while he poured tea into her mug.

"He just lacked emotional connection," she said, unable to keep the defensiveness in her tone. "I mean I get it when he would establish some ground rules. I practically don't see my friends after work. But it's for the best."

"How so?"

Rhoda shrugged. "So that we have more time together." She frowned down at her mug. "It just bothers me when he doesn't follow his own rules. He always comes home late."

Her hands gestured to the right, as words tumbled out. "But that's not his fault because he can be busy." She gestured to the left. "But then the newsies won't stop spilling who's been with him," she looked up to him with earnest eyes, "And I  _want_ to believe him."

She gestured back to the right. "But then there was this time he thought I was someone else and he hit on me and I couldn't even ask him about that because I've been going behind his back spending time with Edna," she put her hands back to the left, "and it's my fault but I just wanted to help other people after work and he wasn't always at home-"

Rhoda knew she was babbling. But she couldn't stop.

"I mean, I always got this horrible feeling that he's been fooling around but I can't just believe it, you know? We've been together for so long. But then, I saw it." Tears welled in her eyes. "When t-they..."

Jesse patiently waited for her to finish. She swallowed and drenched her eyes into her rabbit ears. He rubbed her back to soothe her.

"Promise me you won't get mad?" she asked in a small voice.

He nodded. Taking a deep breath, she told him of the time three young women harassed her in the john and Jared rewarded one of them for it. She wondered why telling that story was now making her cry.

Jesse's hands clenched. Rhoda ducked when the room got a little colder.

He slowly exhaled and the frost dispersed.

"Sorry," Rhoda mumbled.

His hand held her face, a thumb wiping away a tear-stained streak. "I'm not mad at you. I've been wondering why you haven't been yourself for a long time."

Rhoda ducked her head to rub her eyes, relief flooding in her chest.  _Was this what they mean when they say the truth can set you free?_

"I've always known at the back of my mind. But," her hands grasped the air, "I've always got this silly idea that I'd win him back. And it would be just like the old times."

Her hands gripped the table. "I mean, you should've seen him when we were together. He was like a different person when we went steady." She slumped on the table. "You have no idea how much I missed that Jared."

She missed the look on his face as she straightened up in a flash.

"Was that Jared even real?" she asked to no one, almost demanding. "Did I imagined that part of him or… or..." she wilted, her lip quavering.

_Did he really lured me to be used?_

"Nobody could be that bad," she said outloud, her eyes widening in shock.

Jesse only shook his head. "When did he stopped being the Jared you loved?"

Rhoda took a sip of her tea, shrugging. "A long time ago. A few months after we moved in together." She paused, digesting her own words.

 _He stopped being_ that  _Jared… right after we were really serious about each other._

She flopped back on the table, clenching her ears to her face.

"It can't be," she whispered. Her chest hurt as the pieces fall into place. "He really did used me." She glanced at Jesse, wondering if she was right.

"I'm sorry to hear that," Jesse spoke, his eyes hardening as frost formed around him. "You've been together for a long time."

She slumped on the table, still holding her ears over her eyes. "It's because I'm too stupid to realize that he-"

"Don't tell yourself that. He took advantage of you."

"It's my fault I stayed."

"You were being you. The Rhoda I know has a lot of love to give. He took advantage of that. If you left, what do you think you'd do?"

She casted her eyes on the table. "I guess I'd still blame myself for not staying and making things work," she reluctantly answered. "I think I get it now what Edna once told me."

"What's that?"

"Why women blame themselves when their husbands would beat them." Her stomach churned at the comparison. "They couldn't control the men to stop so they blame themselves instead."

"It didn't help that he's always pointing out the speck in my eye!" she exclaimed, sinking on the table and gripping her ears. "I couldn't even make him accountable for the things he had done." Her mind went back to their conversation on the grocery store. "I always have to explain myself to him, I don't know why."

She straightened up, frowning.

"Why am I supposed to go straight home when he always comes home late?" she asked. "I've wondered about it. Why doesn't he try harder to follow his own rules?"

"Those weren't his rules."

"What do you mean?"

"Those rules weren't for the two of you to follow. Those rules were only for you."

Rhoda became silent.

"He's been keeping me from my friends?" she slowly spoke. "He's been keeping me from my family!?" she raised, her words no longer a question.

"It's easy to manipulate someone when they have no one else," Jesse quietly said.

She laughed in bewilderment. Her laughter echoed in the kitchen when she couldn't stop. Tears started spilling from her eyes as cachinnations took control. It turned into sobs as Jesse rubbed her back.

"Sorry," she mumbled. "All this time, it's always me who's in the wrong, I think it messed up my head."

She quieted. With Jared always pointing out her every flaw, she felt compelled to right herself in his eyes. Even her own thoughts.

"You said he was relishing his hold on me." She drank more of the tea, trying to drown out her sadness. "How did you know?"

"I can see it in his face. Rhoda, you looked miserable and he didn't look like he cared."

She paused. "So it wasn't my imagination?"

"It's not. Rhoda, he's been hurting you."

Silence. "Oh." Her hands squeezed the hems of her dress. "It's just that I think he didn't mean to hurt, he was just speaking his mind."

"When he called you a hand-me-down, that wasn't him speaking his mind. That was him being a jerk."

"How do you do it?"

"Do what?"

"Be so detached that nothing affects ya?" she asked, remembering the Maroon Cartoon Anniversary Ball to come. If Jared meant to talk to her, she was sure he'd bait her to make a scene.

He blinked and Rhoda wondered if she had slighted him.

"I know you care a lot," she said, remembering the times his kindness shone. "But nothing seems to faze ya. I want to be like that too."

"Jared always tries to get a rise out of me." She glanced down at her reflection on her tea. "I was never enough in his eyes. If it hurt me, if I react, then I lose because…" Her brows knit into a frown, "Because it gives him a reason to trash anything I would say after."

"You don't have to talk to him."

"He will," she felt surprised at the surety of her own words. "I want him to stop."

Jesse fell silent. "Do you want me to come with you?"

She shook her head. "I already responded to my invite, no plus-one." Her hand clasped his. "It's alright, Jesse."  _I think._  "I know him better now."

His hand turned to hold hers. "Rhoda, I..." they both glanced down on their joined hands before they both let go.

"Whatever you do," Jesse began, "don't expect him to have a change of heart. Telling him to stop isn't going to make him to stop."

"Then I just want him to know I'm not gonna be the same bunny who would bend backwards for him!" she angrily said.

"Don't even think that you can convince him that you've changed either," he advised. "His goal is to make you think less of yourself."

She nodded, digesting his words before she drooped. "I still can't believe he just wants to use me."  _Our good times together, didn't it mean anything to him?_

"Some people are just like that," he said, acceptance edging darkly in his voice.

Rhoda stared at him. He sounded like he had been in the same situation before. "Jesse..." she began. She always had the feeling whatever wisdom he had gotten from life, came from a rough past. Her hands gripped his close. "Thank you."

His fingers moved to hold hers. "Rhoda, I..." He stopped. Then shook his head, retreating back. "... Just be careful around Jared."

In the back of her mind, she wondered what he was going to say. She sheepishly grinned. "It's late. I must be keeping you up."

"You can stay in your room if you want."

Her heart twisted at how he defined his own guest room. "Thanks, Jesse."

He led the way to the stairs. She followed him, feeling the warm comfort of their night time routine.

"Goodnight, Rhoda."

Her lips quirked into a self-deprecating grin, thinking how she had emotionally bared herself in the kitchen. For some reason, she didn't feel regretful at all. For it was Jesse.

She threw her arms around his middle. "Goodnight!"  _I promise, I'll do my best._

A gasp escaped her when he scooped her up for a better hug, his embrace feeling almost protective.

"Everything's going to be alright."

She blinked out of her shock, clutching him tighter.  _Jesse, you really are a great person. I hope you know that._

For a moment, she struggled between telling him praise or an apology for being sudden.

She hopped back on the ground. "Sorr-" she grinned apologetically. "You're a great person, Jesse. I hope you know that."

In the darkness, she could see him smile. "Don't ever apologize."

Closing the door behind her, she sighed. Despite Jesse being intimate for show in his performances, she knew Jesse was never a touchy person. She hoped he felt comfortable with her hugs.

Then she remembered the numerous touches they have shared since she had moved in.

She shook her head. "Don't be lovestruck, he only wants a pal in you," she told herself. With a sad smile, she glanced out of the window to see her rundown cottage.

 _If I want to get over Jesse, I might've to sell that and move somewhere else._ Rhoda nodded to herself. Her hands wrung each other.  _Do I have to tell him WHY I'll be moving out?_

Not wanting to know what would be his reaction if she would, she tried to imagine Jesse's reaction to having a new neighbour instead.

 _He'd be okay. Jesse tends to get along with anybody._  She considered for a moment, thinking about his and Edna's not-so-warm interactions.  _I'll have to ask him about that one though._

Her ears drooped, remembering what would lie ahead. It was now one more day before she had to meet Jared again.

He would bait her, she was sure. He would try to make her play the role he had made her play for fifteen years.

_Can I remember not to be what Jared wants me to be?_


	15. Freedom Can Be Fought

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jared smirked, extending his hand, "May I have this dance?"

_Does it have to be a ballroom party?_

Usually in Maroon Cartoon Anniversary Balls, the studio stars perform. Whoever the party planners were, decided everyone should hoof it tonight.

She tried to keep an eye out for Jared. But every time she saw him, a part of her simply wanted to avoid him all evening.

 _Isn't that what exes do? Leave each other alone?_  she groaned in thought.

She was almost having a good time. Speeches were spoken. People mingled. Some of the stars approached the investors to make them feel welcomed, one of them being Rhoda. One of them accidentally choked when she pantomimed a stuffy waiter with a handlebar mustache.

Mina snorted as she was carried off by the rabbit. "That was almost fun," Mina commented.

"Fun?! I just gave him the hiney lick maneuver!" Rhoda whispered loudly as she tried to blend in the crowd. She had already helped the poor man get his bearings .But she was pretty sure Maroon was going to kill her if she heard about it.

"You mean the Heimlich maneuver?" Mina deadpanned.

"That's what it's called?" she shrugged. No wonder people had been giving her strange looks when she would proudly proclaim that she knew that first aid procedure.

Mina laughed out loud, making Rhoda smile.

"Now, this is fun," she said. "Mina, can I ask you something?"

She could feel Mina tensed, a wall going up between them. Rhoda never understood her for it.

"What is it, rabbit?"

"Can we spend more time together?"

Mina raised a brow. "What now?" Rabbit ears drooped at her cagey tone. Her feet led to the privacy of a moonlit balcony.

"We used to be close as co-stars. But then we drifted apart for some reason," Rhoda said.

Mina looked away, crossing her arms. "If you weren't such a bitch, we still might be."

Her heart dropped. "What do you mean?"

Mina hopped out of her arms, glaring at her. "You think I don't know what you really think of me?"

"What?"

"Don't be such a two-face, Jared told me what you really think of me!" Mina gave a dry laugh at the invisible elephant between them for years. "You really wanna do this now?"

Rhoda's heart raced. Her brows furrowed, trying to make sense of the situation. "What do you mean? What did I do?!"

Mina stopped. If Rhoda wasn't mistaken, she'd swore that she had just blushed. Mina growled, stubbornly crossing her arms as she gazed somewhere else.

"I don't really care what an idiot rabbit like you thinks."

Rhoda knelt down to look at her. "Mina, what did Jared told you?" she asked, her heart drumming fast.  _Why am I having a feeling of deja vu?_

Mina grumbled, still not looking at her. "He told me you said I'm not a woman enough," she said, her voice becoming smaller.

Rhoda put a hand over her mouth in shock, knowing how much Mina fought to be taken seriously in a baby's body.

"Eurrrgh!" Mina raged. "I really don't care what you think!" she flustered, throwing up her chubby, baby arms. "What do you know?! But next time, just say it to my face instead of acting like yer a pal of mine!" she said, practically spitting out the word "pal".

She huffed. "Anyway, who cares? That's been a long time ago. I don't really care. So stop being such a fake -hrrrk!"

Her rant was stopped by Rhoda grabbing her into a hug.

Mina tried to shake her off. "Geroff me, you-"

Rhoda parted away, her hands on Mina's shoulders. "I'm so sorry-"

"The heck you are-"

"I never said anything like that-" Rhoda tried not to cry, knowing how Mina would bottle up her own issues.

Mina snorted.

"It's true! Jared's lying! He did the same thing to Ash!"

Mina smoothed down her tuft of baby hair. "Like I said, that has been a long time ago and I don't really care."

Rhoda stared as Mina turned her back and left. Mina was never the trusting type. Nor the type to talk about feelings, preferring to mask with gruff wit and cigar smoke. The fact that she thought Rhoda had been talking behind her back and finding out she might've been lied to, she could tell Mina was going to need a moment.

As she left the balcony, her hands slowly clenched, feeling her own paint boil. Jared had taken away so much from her.

She wasn't going to let him take anything away from her anymore.

 _Getting affected is what he would want from you,_  she reminded herself as she kept on walking.

The ballroom suddenly went dark. She shielded her eyes when spotlights shone a pool in the center. Somewhere, the band began to play the Anniversary Waltz.

Rhoda backed away when she realized she had walked into the middle of the dancefloor.

"Jeepers," she muttered, trying to avoid the waltzing partners.

She tried not to draw attention to herself, but it was kind of hard when she was the only one alone in a bright red dress.

 _Almost there_ , she thought as she neared the crowd of onlookers. She almost bumped into a couple. Her body dodged them in a split second, turning around in a pirouette.

As soon as she stopped spinning, she found herself face to face with Jared.

His eyes were cool, a smirk in place as he extended his hand. "May I have this dance?"

Rhoda stiffened.  _Why, Jared? What do you have to gain from this?_  She glanced at the curious guests standing by. No doubt watching how these split couple are handling their breakup.

She thought of Jesse before she took his hand.

Jared lifted her up, her bottom perched on his forearm as his fingers gripped her shin. Rhoda put her hand on his shoulder, the feel of his form familiar under her touch. With her other hand, she laced her fingers with his.

She wanted more than anything to scramble out of his grasp and scrub herself clean.

Around them the music played and her ears swivelled at the song the singer was crooning.

_Here I am with you_

_In a world of blue_

_While we're dancing to_

_The tango we loved_

_When we first met_

Rhoda tried not to groan as the singer went on about happier times. She could feel the stares of people around them.

_While the music plays_

_I recall the days_

_When our love was a tune_

_That we couldn't soon forget_

Fate was not on her side tonight as she endured.

"So how's my replacement?" he asked.

Her eye twitched .  _Relax._ "What replacement?"

The last notes of the song warbled as he spun them around. "Don't play dumb. You're not that much of an ingenue." He dipped her low with a veiled smile. "Of course, you wouldn't know what that means."

The band burst stormy and foreboding with violins. Dancers around them tensed into tango. Jared swiftly lifted her up and moved them forward.

Rhoda chose not to respond. He twirled her away and with a tug on her hand, whirled her closer to a tight embrace, her legs dangling and his hand on her back.

"How did you get him to be sorry enough to be with you?" he whispered in her ear, dragging his palm across her shoulders.

Rhoda shut her eyes tight, remembering what Jesse had told her before.

" _Sometimes , observing people distracts the mind from reacting."_

Jared startled when she pushed herself off him and dropped down on the ground. Recovering from the shock, he mirrored her swishing skirts with flowing steps.

 _First, an insult. Then a question,_  she noted, moving into a flamenco stance.  _He's going to try again._

He caught hold of her hand and swung her around. She mightily kicked her legs, clearing her mind.  _Anger_   _gone_. _Focus._

He caught her calf, his other hand gliding around her waist as he danced them around. "But really, Rhoda? Jesse? Can you be more obvious?" he asked. "Running off to my downgrade?"

She went on with her mental observation.  _He's trying to make you question-_

A gasp escaped her when she was suddenly dropped and twirled too many times too fast. She was left wobbling, stars spinning. Before she could fall back, someone caught her from behind. A mouth whispered into her ear.

"You know you could never replace me."

She shot out of his grasp and danced backwards, Jared following her. She stamped her feet, swishing her dress. The band played on a ring of fire.

Rhoda finally stretched out her hand and Jared used it to tug her flush against him. She grasped him close, looking at him straight in the eye.

"Jesse is ten times the man that you'll ever be."

His eyes widened before they glared. His grip tightened. "Is he now?."

He lifted her up by the thighs. A wave of repulsion drenched her when she felt his thumb run up her inner thigh. She stamped the urge to slap him across the face.

 _He's messing with your head_. Her hands clenched the fabric on his shoulders. "I want you to leave me alone."

Jared only smirked, bringing her close into his arms again. "What did I even do?"

She let him moved them across the dance floor. "You've been through a lot and I made some mistakes," she evenly said, saying the words that had always been in her mind. "But you're going too far with the what you're telling the press."

Through her stutter that he had always hated, she firmly grinded out. "P-p-p-please, stop it.."

He dipped her and pulled her back with eyes that told her lack of power.

"It's not my fault what others would do to you for me."

Something in her cracked. For a moment, she understood.

His breath hitched when she suddenly turned them around. He lost his balance at the force of her toon strength and before he knew it, he was falling.

She caught him just in time in a dancer's dip, one hand around his back, and the other bunching his tie.

"I've been in Maroon Studios longer than you. My movies are making more money than yours. Stop or I'll make Maroon choose between you and me."

She almost felt sad as she stared at his shocked face. Sad for him. Sad for what could've been. Without the condescending look in his eyes, he almost looked like the Jared that she had fallen in love with. In a flash, she remembered why she had given him a chance.

The music ended.

"I'm sorry I couldn't help you. But we're through."

Righting him up, she walked out of the dance floor.

An ugly look crossed his face and Jared tried to grab her back.

He stopped when Mina appeared between them. She extended her hand with a scowl that bore no good fortune.

"Care for a dance?"

**XOXOXOXOXO**

Crickets chirped outside the venue of the anniversary ball. In the parking lot, a pumpkin carriage sat with its windows lit.

"Breathe, Rhoda."

She clutched the paperbag around her mouth, gasping. Ash patted her back. Across them inside the carriage, was his wife, Princess Charm.

"That was daring," she said with a smile. They had watched the whole dance and Ash immediately came to Rhoda's rescue as soon as she left the dance floor.

"I-I did it," Rhoda gasped. "I stood up to him without -"  _without being messed up in the head again,_  she added. She only sighed.

"That you did," Ash said, ruffling the top of her head.

She dropped back on the couch. "Jeepers, I can't believe I threatened him." She gave out a weak chuckle. "I don't even want to involve Maroon into this."

But in the back of her mind, she knew she would do it. She would bring her case to Maroon of Jared's harassments and let her decide.

"You have to," Ash said, "Sometimes, you have to do a Mina."

"Trust me, I would've done more," Mina replied darkly. "Ya think he would stay away this time?" she asked, leaning against the window beside Princess Charm. "You could always sue him for defamation, you know."

Rhoda shrugged. "It's his word against mine."

"Our words against his," Ash said, putting a hand on her shoulder. "You got us."

Mina rolled her eyes. "Just try not to protect him again. Yer always excusing him to be a misunderstood fella."

"Yeah," Rhoda admitted, putting a hand on her chest.  _Is this what it feels like to get someone out of my system?_  she wondered.

"I'm just happy to get him out of my "hare"," she joked.

"The night is still young," Princess Charm said, moving aside the curtains of the carriage windows. "Where do you want to go?"

"We can celebrate, you know," Ash said, tapping the pumpkin carriage. "We got beyond midnight."

She thought back at Jesse who was probably still working in the Ink-and-Paint club.

_Thank you, Jesse._

As much as she wanted to go, patron toons weren't allowed.

"Can we have ice cream?" she asked.

**XOXOXOXOXO**

It was one in the morning by the time Jesse exited the club, suit jacket draped on his arm. He stopped when he saw a pumpkin carriage waiting outside.

"Jesse!" Rhoda waved from the inside. She got out, saying goodbye to the occupants before the carriage rode off. In the pool of lamplights, she ran across the parking lot towards him.

She tripped, her face dragging across the asphalt.

Jesse jogged towards her. "Are you okay?" he asked, kneeling down in concern.

She lifted her face, revealing a black eye and a bruised nose. "Am I okay?" she echoed. Instinctively, she shook herself.

He gasped when her injuries disappeared. Her eyes widened, touching her forehead where a huge bump had resided.

"Jeepers," she whispered at her tooning restored. She laughed. First in chuckles. Then in guffaws. Then she crowed, long and loud.

She threw her arms around him in joy, knocking him back to the ground.

"Sorry!" she yelped, getting off him as quickly as she could. But Jesse put a hand around her back, stopping her from getting off as he gave out a chuckle.

"Don't ever apologize."

She smiled at him, throwing caution to the wind of what would people think if they saw them lying on the concrete.

"How was it?" he asked. "The ball?"

She grinned, feeling like she could cry and laugh at the same time. Instead, she closed her eyes in relief, resting her head on his chest for a moment.

"I feel free," she said, almost in wonder.

He hummed, as they got up. "You can tell me about it in the car."

They walked towards the parking lot and maybe she was still high from the emotions. Because she held his hand without trepidation.

He didn't seem to mind.

"Let's go home, Jesse."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One final chapter to go. The tango scene music and dance was inspired by "A. Piazzolla. Libertango" in Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kdhTodxH7Gw


	16. And You Can Be Whole Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "So when are ya goin' ta start datin' again, Aunt Rhoda?" she asked, not missing how Jesse glanced back before disappearing to the other room.

**Chapter 16: And You Can Be Whole Again**

It was surprising how fast a horde of sparrows could chip wood away.

Frost White's high note carried throughout the cottage as woodland creatures scurried around. Beavers gnawed and carried away the rotted beams. Raccoons paired up into teams to handle tools as large as them.

Penny whistled with the larks as she swept. Coco helped Aurelius install new windows as Ash chopped the brambles outside.

"Thanks for your help, everyone!" Rhoda said as she and Jesse finished applying joint cement on the new walls.

"No worries. We're glad you asked for our help," Aurelius said.

Just as Jesse left with cans of paint, Penny grinned, a halo forming above her head.

"So when are ya goin' ta start datin' again, Aunt Rhoda?" she asked, not missing how Jesse glanced back before disappearing to the other room.

Her aunt wiped away her cement smoother. "I dunno, Penny."

"'Cause I'm pretty certain Papa knows plenty of nice fellas", Penny trilled in a singsong voice that carried throughout the cottage. Her grin became wider when they heard a crash of paint cans dropping.

Rhoda turned at the noise, confused. Jesse was never clumsy.

"'Cause I'm pretty certin' Papi knows plenty of nice fellas," Penny trilled in a singsong voice that carried throughout the cottage. Her grin became wider when they heard a crash of paint cans dropping.

"I have plenty of friends who are single too," Frost White quipped.

Rhoda paused. "Um?.."

"And I know a lot of ladies who you could get along with," Aurelius yawned.

"Great!" Penny exclaimed. "What's your type, Aunt Rhoda?"

"Who wants snacks?" Rhoda rushed, ushering them out of the house.

Just when she thought she had them distracted, Ash joined them, walking by Rhoda's side. "They're right, you know," he said, hearing their conversation.

"Not you too," Rhoda whispered back.

"You should see other people first before even considering  _him_."

Rhoda groaned.

**XOXOXOXO**

The psychiatrist's office was spic and span. Rhoda stared up at the ceiling as she lay on the recliner.

"A part of me missed it," she spoke, disturbed. She looked up at the ceiling, her arms wrapped around her. Worry creased her face. "I know what makes him tick. I know what would make him happy." Her voice dropped into a whisper. "I don't even know when it became scary to be around other people."

Dr. Edgar Wood slowly chewed on his pencil.

"I'm very much aware that he's bad for me," she continued, tugging her ears. "But a part of it felt safe in it." She shuddered. "I shouldn't even be feeling this way! Is this even normal?" she cried, getting up.

The beaver psych took the pencil out of his mouth.

"Ms. Rabbit, after getting out of an abusive relationship, it's normal to be anxious. What you had with him has been your norm." He adjusted his clipboard. "It feels safe because it's predictable. He has forced you to play the role of an overlooking, pleasing partner for years. It takes a while to remember to be yourself." He paused. "Again and again."

Rhoda nodded, her eyes still glued to the ceiling. She gave a self-deprecating laugh. "I still can't believe I've been in an abusive relationship. He's never even hit me before, you know."

"No, but psychological abuse usually comes without visible wounds."

She fell silent, remembering how he had forced often her to doubt her own thoughts and feelings over what he thinks she would think and feel. Dr. Wood had called it gaslighting.

Her fists clenched. "Most of me never want to go back. I don't want to feel that way ever again." She deflated. "I can't believe he would never admit he was wrong."

"People might hurt us, Ms. Rabbit," Dr. Wood spoke, his voice soothing. "But it's up to us to heal ourselves."

**XOXOXOXO**

Inside her renovated cottage, Rhoda got the surprise of her life when Ash, Frost White and Aurelius visited her once again.

"I can't believe you got all of my stuff back!" she said in awe, looking at the boxes that they had gotten in what used to be her and Jared's apartment.

"Of course, we simple used our grace, charm and diplomatic skills as Disney Princes," Aurelius said. "It was very nice of Jared to accommodate us."

"Um..." Rhoda said, eyeing the humongous spindle that Aurelius tucked into his belt, its sharp spike glinting in the light.

"Oh yes," Frost White quipped, one of the apples in his basket glowing an ominous green. "It certainly has nothing to do with Ash smashing the end of his glass forearm bracelet against the wall and holding it like a shiv."

Rhoda slowly turned to Ash, dumbstruck.

Ash threw a bag into a trash that fell with the sound of tinkling glass. "We might've taken some liberties since he's no longer under your protection."

**XOXOXOXO**

"Hey Mater. Hey Pater."

Back in Kansas, Rhoda put down her picnic basket in front of two graves.

"It's been a while, huh?"

She knelt down on the grass, setting down a bouquet of flowers.

"I'm good. I've been seeing a psych about my coffee addictions by the way," she spoke outloud. "Dr. Wood? Ash recommended him when he was going through the effects of his tragic backstory."

The wind whistled through the fields.

"Jeepers, diagnosed with deflation and gaiety?... detection and deity?" She thought for a moment before snapping her fingers. "Depression and anxiety!"

She sighed, her shoulders dropping. "I couldn't believe it. I'm supposed to be the happy hare." She trained her eyes on the ground, fidgeting with the hem of her skirt. "But Dr. Wood told me some people just feel just a little more intensely. He gave me pills help me with my mood." Her head shook from side to side. "I don't wanna at first. But I think they're working."

Throughout the years, she would sometimes wonder what they would be thinking, watching her from wherever they were. Were they proud of her? Horrified? Ashamed?

"I'm sorry you have to see all of that."

The Kansas winds blew warm and comforting through her ears.

She rubbed her eyes. "Jeepers, I miss y'all."

**XOXOXOXO**

"I have to admit, I got me doubts get the better of me." Mina stubbed her cigar on the ashtray. "I mean I hate that guy. But I could never understand you, y'know?"

Rhoda ate up her fried rice, adding more whipped cream, vinegar, hot sauce and broccoli in it. "I get that a lot."

"What does that even taste?" Mina asked, turning slightly green at the sight of her dish. "Anyway, you ain't normal if you could honestly stand me, no co-star ever had." She sipped her vodka. "So when I heard Jared told me that, well..."

Rhoda felt herself smile. In Mina language, it was her own way of apologizing. She reached for her hand.

"I'll always like you, Mina."

Mina made a face. "I support wherever you'll swing but please..."

Rhoda laughed out loud. A waitress came by with a plate of carrot cake. Mina saw it and frowned.

"Ya sure?" she asked.

Rhoda glared at it determinedly. "I'm gonna reclaim my love for carrot cakes and I'm not gonna let Jared ruin it for me ever again." She took a deep breath. "Don'tcha worry, Mina. I got a secret weapon," she said, thanking the waitress for the fresh cup of jasmine tea with orange on it.

Grabbing the fork, she prepared to cut herself a piece. In an impulse, she threw away the fork and ate the whole slice instead. Mina watched with horrified fascination as she chomped and chewed. Rhoda's eyes twitched. Her fist pounded the table in an internal war of taste and trauma.

Mina hunched, slightly covering her own face in case someone might recognize her. "Oh no, this is definitely not gonna haunt me in my sleep."

Just when she was sure Rhoda was about to choke in her struggle, Rhoda grabbed her cup and chugged all of its contents.

Mina watched as Rhoda coughed and hacked, swallowing tea leaves in the process. The rabbit slammed back the cup on the table, gasping.

Then she collapsed across their table.

Mina moved the centerpiece of flowers closer to Rhoda to honor the dead.

With a huge gasp, Rhoda revived, looking like a cat who gave birth to hairballs through her mouth.

"My psych says," she belched, "... that a positive association might make the bad ones go away."

"And when did hot leaf juice ever become something positive?" Mina asked, rolling her eyes as she lit another cigar.

Rhoda chose not to reply, slurping a glass of water instead.

"So," Mina said, her tone becoming businesslike. "Are you two fucking?"

Mina simply closed her eyes when Rhoda's mouth drenched her like a hose.

"WHAT?!"

"Y'know, your hot neighbor? Yeah, he looks like Jared but you can always close your eyes."

"What?! No!" she exclaimed, her whole body combusting into a shade of red that could be seen from a mile away.

Mina simply wiped her face. "Really? Not even a kiss? Never even went down on ya?"

"No- wait, "went down on ya"?" Her ears curled to question marks. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Mina baldly told her and Rhoda hid her face with her hands and ears.

"That's a thing?" she mumbled through her palms.

"Of course that's a thing!" Mina paused. "Jared didn't even do that to you?"

Rhoda sank lower in her seat. "Can we not talk it in here?"

Mina eyed her carefully. "But you did went down on Jared," she observed. "Gawd, rabbit. He's either an idiot or that really tells a lot." She gave a squawk when Rhoda slapped a palm over her mouth.

"Why is it that every time you talk, it always leads to the birds and the bees?" Rhoda asked.

Mina bit her.

"Ow!" She hastily shook her hand. "Besides, I'm tryin' to meet other people."

Mina spit out a bit of yellow glove clothing. "Finally given in to Ash's nagging?"

"I did ask someone out, they told me no," Rhoda replied. She glanced down at her empty cup of tea. "I just want to be a good friend and get over  _him_."

"Huh? What?"

She hastily gave Mina a monkey grin. "I said I just want to spend time with all my friends!" she cried, flinging her arms wide open for a crushing hug.

Mina flung a sugar bowl to her face. Needless to say, they got kicked out of the cafe.

**XOXOXOXO**

Inside the cottage, things were as cozy as a rabbit's burrow. Summer rains came and Jacques contentedly lay on the rug.

"Then Edna burst into the rescue!" Rhoda said, swinging her fists. "Bam! Pow! Wham! Knockin' their lights out!"

Beside her, sat Jesse, leaning on the other side of the sofa.

"Aren't you putting yourself in danger?"

Rhoda flopped back on the sofa. "I just wanna make people smile again," she said, having just told him how a search for a lost little girl's father ended up to uncovering a decade of conspiracy. "Besides, I just help her find clues and distract the bad guys. Edna does all the detective work."

He squeezed her hand to catch her attention. "Promise me you'll be careful though."

Rhoda hooked his little finger into a pinky swear. "Promise."

Then she turned to helped herself to another slice of strawberry cake. "This is delish!"

"See? You don't have to force yourself to like carrot cakes again when there are so many options."

Rhoda closed her eyes in bliss, humming as she chewed. Jesse was a better baker than she could hope for herself. At least he didn't end up setting his kitchen on fire.

"I heard you asked Leroy out," Jesse spoke out of the blue.

Chewed mush spurted out of her mouth as though she got a freight train rammed into on the stomach.

"Who told ya?" she gasped, cleaning up her mess.

He casually shrugged. "Leroy told me."

The tips of her ears burned, suddenly feeling self-conscious. True, she was actively trying to get over Jesse. But it seemed that Jesse might've been feeling protective of his old friend Leroy Hyena to bring it up.

"We met each other at work," she said, wondering why she felt like explaining herself. "We were going to be the 'Before' pictures of not taking vitamins." She gave her most cock-eyed, constipated face. "I went with this mug by the way."

Her hands gestured the story along. "He mentioned the movie where you and I both starred in and he said knows ya and I was like-" She put her hands on her cheeks, all starry eyed. "Jeepers! He's a good friend of mine!"

Then she toonily formed into the shape of Leroy with his huge nostrils, uneven teeth and scrawny form. "Then he was like, 'He's a good friend of mine too! He's told me about you,'" she said in her best Leroy voice. He was the ugliest guy she had ever seen. But she could see why Jesse have him as a friend.

Her ams dropped with her act. "After that, we hit it off! We talked about you all day." She put a hand on her chest. "He ain't a looker, but he's a pretty sweet guy. So I thought why not?"

"And you asked him out."

Rhoda wondered about the lack of color in his voice. "He fainted at first. When I woke him up, he said that was the first time a girl ever asked him out. He seemed really happy."

She scratched her head, confused. "But then he was like-" She dropped down on her knees, howling. "-'Nooooo! Not youuu!' And I was like, 'Oh, okay.'"

Realizing she had been babbling, she fumbled with her hands. "I just wanna know him better, Jesse, in case you're worried for him."

"Oh."

She frowned, not understanding why he got quiet. But she was going to take advantage of it. The only way to make it clear to her heart to get over him was to get rejected once again.

Briefly she wondered if she was a sadist.

"Jesse, there's something I need to tell ya."

He turned to face her.

"I've been meaning to sell this house and move somewhere else."

He partly sat up straight. "What? Why?"

She fidgeted with her fingers, squirming. "Ever since I moved here and got in touch with you again, I..."

Her gaze fell on anywhere but him. "Ihavetogetoveryouagain," she spoke like a fastforwarded film.

"What?"

She squeezed her eyes shut.  _I have to get over you again! You're my friend and I want to respect your rejection but I can't stand being so near while you go out with someone else and-_

"Uh, Rhoda, I can't hear you if you're just thinking it outloud."

Her arms drooped as she sighed. "It's just my way of keeping my word to ya."

"What word?" he asked quietly, leaning forward to hear her better.

She, sighed, cornered as he carefully looked into her eyes. "I'm gonna have to let you go again," she said almost in a whisper.

Silence.

His face strangely and tentatively flowed into a smile. "There's something else that I have to tell you too." He reached out a hand. "Have you ever wonder why I rejected you all those years?"

Her eyes moved to his thumb brushing over her cheek. She shrunk a little, feeling the spot burn. "I'm just not your type?"

"Back then, I didn't understand why you liked me just because I'm nice."

"Kind," she corrected, her words getting stuck in her throat. "There's a difference."

He retracted his hand. "When I was first drawn, I wasn't in a very good place."

"I know, you told me it was shady."

"My past employer pretended to be someone that I can trust. When I got out, I coped by distancing myself… from everything." He looked away, momentarily distracted by glimpses of his past. "I may have taken it too far when we met."

"I really enjoyed our time together making that movie," he continued. "After we parted ways, you've made an impression on me."

He swept aside his bangs. "I tried to enter a relationship similar to what I used to have back in my first job." There was a pause as he rolled his eyes. "I know it's ridiculous. But it was familiar. I know what to expect and that time around, it was my choice."

Rhoda put a hand on his shoulder. "You mean, Martha Acme?"

He turned to her with a smile. "You would always be at the back of my mind."

She stilled, unsure how to process what he had said. Jesse continued on.

"Then Doom killed her. Ms. Acme gave me her will as safekeeping but it disappeared. I thought it was one of her practical jokes." His mouth pulled into a frown. "The night after that, I found Ms. Valiant rifling through my dressing room."

"Edna?"

He nodded. "She was hired by someone to snoop around me and Acme. Someone who's interested in her will. Whoever they are, Doom also got her eyes on them and got Edna followed."

"Oh… no wonder you two don't get along."

Jesse sniffed. "Edna and the Doom Patrol practically gunned down my dressing room in Ink-and-Paint Club. The police came, Edna found the will. Turned out Ms. Acme wrote it in invisible ink."

He looked ahead. "I guess the whole fiasco snapped me out of repeating a vicious cycle. Life went on." His eyes caught hers. "Then I met you again."

Jesse ruffled her hair. "A bit more timid. A bit more jumpy. But it's still you."

His hands moved to hold hers. "This is very selfish of me to ask you. But can you give this another chance?

She couldn't move. Her heart pounded. Unwilling to believe unless-

"What 'this'?"

His hands felt warm as he squeezed. "I'm not going to let you go again."

A billion questions blazed within her, catching her unprepared. She felt a bit nervous yet her eyes lit up.

There was only one answer to that question.

**The End**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaand it's done. Thank you for everyone who stuck with me throughout the story, for your feedback, cheers and reactions. All the hidden gems in the past chapters are now listed out in the Easter Eggs chapter, including what happened eventually to Rhoda and Jesse, if you're wondering what happened next.


	17. Easter Eggs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hidden gems and references in The Old Pieces and The New

**Chapter 1: Mistakes Had Been Made**

-Jacques was inspired by Jack Rabbit, Rhoda and Jesse's son in an alternate universe. Jacques was supposed to be a Grim-like dog that came to her time of need like an animal guide.

-Ronnie was inspired by Rose Rabbit, Rhoda and Jesse's daughter in the same au.

**Chapter 2: Damages Had Been Done**

-Once again, Rhoda's song came from the opening theme song of "Crazy Ex Girlfriend"

-In here, Rhoda liking jasmine tea because "Who Censored Roger Rabbit" mentioned Roger Rabbit like drinking jasmine tea (from what I can remember, I tried to research it but I can't find the site where I read the book before) from his favorite kettle.

-The DeGreasy Sisters came from "Who Censored Roger Rabbit"'s The DeGreasy Brothers. In the book, they're Roger's boss and one of them dated Jessica after she left Roger.

**Chapter 3: Feelings Had Been Forgotten**

-In the prequel script of WFRR, "Roger Rabbit: Toon Platoon", Roger's backstory is a Superman backstory parody. He grew up in a Kansas Farm with his human parents.

-Rhoda being a handyman was inspired by the Roger Rabbit comics where one of his hobbies are inventing stuff.

-Rhoda not being able to toon properly because she was too distracted by relationship troubles came from, of course, WFRR.

-Director Minkoff was an Easter Egg in "Roger Rabbit's Trail-Mix Up"

**Chapter 4: Secrets Had Been Suppressed**

-None… or is there? (Seriously, don't look for it. You got better use for your time.)

**Chapter 5: Regrets Had Been Reinforced**

-Once again, song was inspired by the mother part of the song, "The Mariner's Revenge Song" by the talented Decemberists.

\- "-a love that is everywhere and filling her" Shape of Water references, anybody?

-Another obvious Disney reference, "Poor Unfortunate Souls" from The Little Mermaid.

-In one of the Superman comics where his parents died early (making him more punchier and asking questions later), Martha and Jonathan Kent died in a car crash. Similar to what happened to Rhoda's parents.

-In the movie, Fantasia, there is a scene of Bald Mountain where Satan crawled out of and turned shadows into every demon imaginable. So in this chapter, Rhoda did faced her demons: her fear of being assaulted again, Jared and her remorse and self-hate after the death of her parents.

-In the WFRR movie, the Weasels "died" but they were still in this plane of existence but Dip erases toons from ever existing again.

**Chapter 6: Dreams Had Been Dashed**

-Song is from "A Dream Is A Wish Your Heart Makes" in Disney's Cinderella (1950)

-If Ash is the guy version of Cinderella, Frost White is to Snow White of Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (1937) as Aurelius is to Aurora of Disney's Sleeping Beauty (1959).

-Frost White's merry whistling while the animals were cleaning was from Snow White's song, "Whistle While You Work"

**Chapter 7: However…**

-Jared is indeed a rake. Rake used to be a slang for womanizing in the late 17th century.

-Sadly (or perhaps, gladly), none after.

**Chapter 8: Resilience Can Be Remembered**

-In "Who Censored Roger Rabbit", the song "When You Wish Upon A Star" is Jessica and Roger's song. When Roger tried to win her back, he played it on the piano to make her remember of their happier times.

-21st Lump Street is a reference to a certain movie ;)

-In the WCRR book, the other DeGreasy brother wasn't very bright and used his size to intimidate others.

-Toon Tonic was mentioned in "Who P-p-p-plugged Roger Rabbit" where Roger became human (not a humanoid toon). I haven't read the entire thing but someone told me that Roger was described to make a very ugly human.

-Rhoda Rabbit figuring out the case is a callback to the Roger Rabbit comics "Who Framed Rick Flint" where he solved a criminal case by his own.

**Chapter 9: Solace Can Be Sought**

-Toon Police as bulldodgs is a reference to the Roger Rabbit comics.

-Jared being part of the movie,  _Gone with the Wind,_  is a reference to "Who P-p-p-plugged Roger Rabbit".

-In the plot of "Who P-p-p-plugged Roger Rabbit", Roger hired Eddie to put a stop on the rumors about Jessica having affairs left and right. Along the way, he drank Toon Tonic that made him human. Jessica flirted with him, not knowing he was Roger. (At least this was told to me by a friend.)

-In "Who Censored Roger Rabbit", Roger likes his jasmine tea with orange.

**Chapter 10: Felicity Can Be Found**

-The song sang by Penny is "Is You or Is You Ain't My Baby", a 1944 song.

-Jacques taking a shine on Coco is related to Jack being Coco friend. Ronnie liking Penny is related to Rose being Penny's friend.

-Rhoda and Jesse getting tangled up with the leashes is a 101 Dalmatian reference with Roger and Anita.

-Penny Boop's "boop-oop-a-doop" is Betty Boop's catchphrase.

-If you wanna see how Penny and Coco look like, check [Donutsforlife in DeviantartDOTcom](https://www.deviantart.com/donutsarelife/gallery/67715291/Whenyinmetyang-Universe-Stuff). She also made art of Jesse, Rhoda, Jack and Rose. Don't forget to like, comment and follow her for more!

**Chapter 11: Experiences Can Be Enlightened**

-Betty Boop used to be an anthropomorph french poodle in 1930 until she was drawn as a completely humanoid toon in 1931.

-Cole the parrot is named after Nat King Cole, a jazz pianist and vocalist.

-Koko the Clown came from the age of silent toons. He can talk eventually in the more modern cartoons. In Donutsforlife's profile, she and her family use both French sign language and American sign language.

-Coco's line, "He's poison! But Aunt Rhoda think he's Benny Crocker" is a reference to the WFRR movie's RK Maroon's line, "Look, Valiant! His wife's poison, but he thinks she's Betty Crocker."

**Chapter 12: Fallacies Can Be Faced**

-One of the biggest hurt "Who Censored Roger Rabbit" Jessica has done to Roger was saying outloud that he has no talent.

**Chapter 13: Clarity Can Be Caught**

-All the symbolism that you can think of in Rhoda's fevered thoughts ala Wizard in Oz and Alice in Wonderland.

**Chapter 14: Resolve Can Be Renewed**

-Family, friend or lover, being in a relationship with a toxic person makes the person play a role in a codependent relationship.

-In this chapter, I can't help but noticed that Rhoda and Jesse won't stop touching each other. I dunno, it just felt natural to write them that way when they're together in this story.

-Also I tried my best that Jesse isn't treated as Rhoda's psychiatrist or something, but more as a friend who had been there and could help.

**Chapter 15: Freedom Can Be Fought**

-The tango scene was foreshadowed in Chapter 5 where Rhoda hallucinated her parents singing and they mention, "as you face the dance of strife".

-The tango scene music and dance was inspired by "A. Piazzolla. Libertango" in Youtube.

-The lyrics in this chapter is from 1952 Blue Tango.

**Chapter 16: And You Can Be Whole Again**

-Dr. Edgar Wood has appeared in one of my fics but as a psychologist as Rhoda's friend. In here, they have a more professional relationship as patient and doctor.

-Ash holding his broken forearm glass bracelet like a shiv was inspired by Cinderella in Wreck-It Ralph 2.

-Ash's tragic backstory can be explored in Cinderella's past in Youtube video, ["Cinderella: Stop Blaming the Victim" by The Take](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huLSdm6IH0g).

-To those who don't know, Leroy Hyena is the male binary swap of Lena Hyena. In Roger Rabbit ToonTown, she and Jessica Rabbit are good friends. In this fic, Leroy had to tell Jesse to make his move before Rhoda asks someone else out.

-After they got together, Rhoda and Jesse dated for a few months before Rhoda rented her cottage and began living with Jesse. After many months of living together, they eventually tied the knot.

-If you want a Roger/Jessica version of "The Old Pieces and the New", simply replace Rhoda with Roger, Jesse with Jessica and Jared with Jezebel in your head. Lol.

-If you read the chapter titles, there's a message ;)


	18. Research Notes

**24 out of 64 signs of the mental and emotional abuse Jared gave to Rhoda according to[Healthline](https://www.healthline.com/health/signs-of-mental-abuse#what-to-do)**

I thought I might as well put it here. You might know people who are going through what Rhoda went through and they don't even know it. Is this an overkill? Probably.

**I. Humiliation, negating, criticizing**

✔ Character assassination: telling her she's "always" overreacting, imagining things, too needy or annoying, etc.

✔ Dismissiveness: dismisses her questions and worries as someone being silly or obsessive.

✔ Derogatory "pet" names: calling her "dummy bunny"

✔ Pushing her buttons. Once he knew what would affect her, he'd bring it up or do it every chance he gets.

**II. Control and shame**

✔ Using others to tell her that she is unacceptable. "They all say...", "Everyone thinks..."

**III. Accusing, blaming, and denial**

✔ Denying her about her efforts to openly communicate with him about the gossips.

✔ Trivializing. He dismisses her hurt feelings and her attempt to tell him so. Telling her she was being too sensitive, needy or overreacting.

✔ Accusing Rhoda of abuse by saying she's obsessed and that he puts a lot to maintain their relationship.

✔ Goading then blaming. Jared knows how to upset her. But once the trouble starts, it's Rhoda's fault for creating it.

**IV. Emotional neglect and isolation**

✔ Actively turns her friends and family against her by isolation and false information. Actively turns people against her by telling the media that she's possessive of him while insinuating that she's unfaithful because of being a rabbit.

✔ Dehumanizes Rhoda by refusing to communicate unless she defend, explain and justify herself to him.

✔ Calling her needy every time she reached out for support or reassurance.

✔ Disputing her feelings of worry and insecurity of their relationship as being obsessed.

✔ Withholds affection by dropping her when she tried to hug him just because he's mad at her.

**V. Rhoda's signs of Codependence**

A codependent relationship is when everything you do is in reaction to your abuser's behavior. And they need you just as much to boost their own self-esteem. You've forgotten how to be any other way. It's a vicious circle of unhealthy behavior.

✔ She's unhappy in the relationship but fears to be alone, especially at the death of her parents.

✔ Consistently neglect what makes her happy (her hobby that he calls farm-ish, spending time with her friends) for the sake of making him happy.

✔ She stopped spending time with her friends and not visiting her parents during the holidays to to please him.

✔ Criticizing herself through Jared's eyes and ignoring what she really think.

✔ Rhoda made a lot of sacrifices to please Jared, but they're not reciprocated.

✔ She feels responsible at the hurt Jared had given to the Fleischer Flock and blames herself for something that he did.

✔ She believes Jared into thinking she's lucky to be in a relationship and that no one else would want her.

✔ She thinks she deserves the treatment because of her flaws and her guilt over her parents.

✔ In one interaction, she thought she broke an unspoken rule of speaking out if she wanted to not rock the boat.

✔ She tries to rescue Jared from himself.

✔ When others point out the not-so-nice stuff Jared does to her, she defends him.

**Effects of Gaslighting experienced by Rhoda according to[Healthline](https://www.healthline.com/health/gaslighting#signs)**

✔ Often blames herself when things go wrong.

✔ Low self-esteem and feeling like everything she do is wrong.

✔ Apologizing often

✔ Having a sense that something's wrong, but being unable to identify what it is.

**Jared's Characterization**

-Jared is a narcissistic puppet master upon wooing Rhoda and during their relationship. He lied, cheated, seduced and withheld affection to get what he wanted, exploiting her insecurities and vulnerabilities without remorse.

-As a toxic narcissist, he thrives in destroying Rhoda's career and imploding her emotionally and physically -bordering into antisocial personality.

-Just like "Who Censored Roger Rabbit" Jessica Rabbit, he is also an amorous narcissist whose self-worth is tied to how many women are attracted to him.

-The song that would describe Jared would be "You Suck At Love" by Simple Plan.


End file.
